


Moxy

by Forest_Girl



Series: Prompto ArTENtum [1]
Category: Ben 10 Series, Final Fantasy XV
Genre: (also really brief and badly written), (for like a brief moment it's barely touched upon), Animal Control - Freeform, Any OCs have a really minor roll in this story and will probably not be mentioned frequently, Bullying, Gen, Guilt, HOO BOY IT'S SLOWBURN, Misunderstandings, More characters will come as more chapters are published, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Somewhat frequent POV switches, slight angst
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-11-03
Updated: 2018-01-04
Packaged: 2019-01-28 18:00:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 22,623
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12612236
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Forest_Girl/pseuds/Forest_Girl
Summary: Walking home from work in the rain, Prompto Argentum takes a shortcut down a side alley, hoping that he'd be able to escape the worst of the storm. In doing so, he discovers a futuristic watch that refuses to come off, just in time for the walls protecting Insomnia to grow unnaturally weak.





	1. *Opening Riff*

**Author's Note:**

> I gotta say, THANK YOU for everyone who reblogged the little snippet from Prompto Week on Tumblr that lead to this monstrosity being born. Special thanks go to onpanwa and yoitssabrinee, who were both major supporters (with yoitssabrinee screaming with me on Tumblr messenger about the fic, lol).
> 
> I hope all of you enjoy this incredibly self-indulgent, nostalgia-filled crossover!

Gunshot wounds, as a general rule of thumb, hurt like a bitch.

However, laser burns hurt worse.

He hissed, cradling his shoulder with his good arm and holding his treasure with his other, stumbling down the alleyway on his twisted ankle. He knew, Gods did he know that he only had so long before he was found. He could almost hear them, like mice, skittering down the roads as they scrambled to find him.

A strained laugh left his lips. Oh, how he wished they were mice, and how he wished he hadn’t been stupid enough to not dodge out of the way of the shot. He wouldn’t be able to fight back—not well, at least—and he only had so long until he stumbled into a dead end. They were tracing him based off the signal of his treasure, and though it killed him, he was well aware of what he would have to do.

Nudging a few trash cans out of the way, he hid his treasure between them, praying that the metal color was similar enough for any of the moronic inhabitants to see it. He placed a partially filled cardboard box on top as well, just for safety’s sake, before taking off at a slightly faster-paced hobble than before.  His injuries would only temporarily delay the inevitable, and he would have the precious treasure in due time. All that mattered was collecting at a later date once he'd recovered, and ensuring that nothing else got in his way.

And absolutely  _ nothing _ would.

* * *

Prompto’s alarm went off at six, but he only really woke up at about a quarter after. With cotton mouth and sleep-crusted eyes, he stumbled to his closet and managed to get his school uniform on without ripping anything or stumbling over his own two feet. After brushing his teeth and running his fingers through his hair, he went downstairs and popped two pieces of toast into the toaster. While waiting for that to finish, he poured himself a glass of orange juice and downed it, the chill and sharp taste helping wake him up.

By the time he finished his morning routine, it was a quarter to seven, and he had about half an hour to make it to school. He cracked his neck, stretched his arms high above his head, and hopped from foot to foot. Picking up his messenger bag, Prompto put in his headphones and started his morning pick-me-up playlist.

“Only eight months left.” Prompto said to himself as he grabbed his bike, a chain, and his padlock. “Only eight months.”

* * *

High school was a battle ground waged by the popular girls with the latest looks and the jocks who reigned supreme, and if you didn’t have your own clique, then you were either ignored or bullied.

For Prompto, it was a mix of the two. The girls typically left him alone, citing him as uninteresting and a nerd. The jocks harassed him daily, mainly taunting him over his body and his lack of friends. They called him a girl, shoved him into lockers, asked if he wanted to be a ‘piggy’ again.

There was only one highlight to Prompto’s day, and that was seeing the Prince in his classes. Through sheer luck alone, they shared a majority of them, and it was a blessing and a curse. It was a blessing in that the Prince was potentially the only person who didn’t know him and immediately hate him off the bat, and being near him had a slight guarantee of him not being bullied. It was a curse in that he got a little bit more harassment for ‘sullying’ the prince for being around him so much.

He suffered through eight periods and left early during ninth, which was gym. Unchaining his bike (and somewhat surprised at the lack of any new vandalism), Prompto pedaled to Lucian Delights to work his shift as the dishwasher. The owner was understanding of Prompto’s social anxiety, and allowed him an easy job so that he could get some pay without having to stress about interacting with strangers each night. It kept his mind off of things and gave him a source of income that wasn’t from his mostly-absent parents.

That would keep him busy until six when, on a normal day, he would bike alongside the few cars that traveled down the cramped streets until he made it home. Sometimes, if there were some leftovers or a mixed-up order, his manager would let him take those home to eat. He always appreciated it, though Prompto never truly understood why she did that.

However, the weather had turned from overcast to a torrential downpour. Prompto’s bike, left outside near the back entrance, had already been soaked through by the time his shift ended. He sighed, taking his blazer off and throwing it over his head as he quickly unchained his bike from the nearby pole and walked home. The rain quickly seeped through the starchy fabric and rolled down his neck, making Prompto shiver.

The trek seemed to take forever, long enough to make him doubt if he was taking the right path home. He looked through his hair, stuck to his face by the rain, and realized that, at the pace he was going, it would take fifteen minutes until he got home. He groaned and actively resisted the urge to throw his head back, knowing it would only make him more wet than he already was.

Biting his lip, he considered his options. It was dark out, compounded by the fact that the thunderstorm reduced his visibility even more. He couldn’t ride his bike, because he could easily be hit by a car, and even then it would just increase how badly he’d get soaked. If he kept going at this pace, however, he probably wouldn’t get home without dragging an ocean in with him, and compounded by the fact that he could barely tell what street he was on, he might not make it back for another twenty minutes.

However, if he took the narrow back alleys, he’d be able to cut the time back home in half. If he risked running, he might make it home in three minutes. He’d always avoided the alleys, mainly because his own paranoia kept reminding him of the various robberies that happened in alleys in movies. So it boiled down to this: did Prompto want a three minute run, or a thirty minute walk?

Thunder rumbled above him, shaking the buildings, and Prompto turned down the alleys at a brisk pace.  He shivered again, unsure if it was from the cold or the crawling fear of being watched, the shadows creeping around him, clawing at his legs—

Prompto shook his head and tightened his grip on the handlebars. If he let his imagination and paranoia run wild, he was going to panic, and if he panicked, he wasn’t going to get home any time soon. He breathed deeply, measuring how long he inhaled and exhaled, tensing and relaxing his grip. If he kept calm, he’d be fine. There was nothing scary in this alley, it was just his imagination—

The flash of green in his peripheral vision was all the warning he got. With a sharp (and not at all  _ girlish) _ scream, Prompto raised his arm to protect his face, feeling something cold and metallic clamp onto his wrist. Stumbling back, his bike fell to the ground with a clatter and he tripped over it, falling into a couple trash cans.

Breathing in the stink of days-old trash, Prompto looked around for whoever had attacked him, only to see nothing but the relentless rain. He patted his chest, then his face, wiggled his toes and kicked out with his legs to get off the trashcan. His blazer had taken the brunt of the fall, and Prompto picked it up with the tips of his fingers and tied it to his waist.

“That’s gonna be a pain to wash…” Prompto mumbled, now feeling the heavy droplets of water falling in sheets on his head. With a grimace, Prompto looked down at his wrist, prepared to see a faint bruise from a trash can lid, or maybe in the shape of the bike’s bars.

His heart froze in his chest as he saw a large, completely unfamiliar watch on his wrist. Though it was hard to make out in the near-darkness, it’s hourglass face was back lit by a green light, casting the alley in a sickly light. Flipping his wrist around, he tried to find the latch to get it off, only for his fingers to slip and scrabble at the smooth metal.  For a moment, he blamed his mounting panic. It was a  _ watch, _  and watches had release latches, and he was probably just missing it because there wasn't a lot of light to help him find it. But upon running his fingers over the cool metal surface over and over, the only breaks in the endless smoothness were intentional designs. There was no obvious break, no latch, and metal couldn’t  bend, not enough to get it off his wrist.

His panic took control, and somehow he managed to grab his bike, pedaling faster than he’s ever pedaled before. As the cold watch weighed heavy on his arm, it took everything Prompto had to keep his breaths even as he raced home, the beating of his heart drowned out by the deafening thunder overhead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> \- In this AU, Prompto and Noct haven’t met in high school yet. They’ve only had the one interaction when they were much younger (and Prom was much bigger) so Prompto only knows him as The Prince that he embarrassed himself in front of and nothing more.
> 
> \- Prompto’s parents will be mostly absent during this fic, and when they do appear, they’ll be OCs. As much as I love the idea of Dad!Cor, it would kinda fuck up the ideas I have going for this series.
> 
> \- The Omnitrix (or the weird watch, as Prompto will call for now and almost forever) has the original ten aliens from the original show. Along with that, all the names will be different, as Prompto obviously has a different thought process about naming things than Ben. Eventually, more will be ‘unlocked’, but for now, we’ve got the OG Team. As such, when each one gets unlocked, I’ll tag the original alien’s name, and then what Prompto comes up with. After this fic, that won’t happen (because then I’ll have to tag 20+ characters, and nobody got time for that).


	2. It Started When

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompto calls in sick and does everything he can do to take the watch off, even going as far to take his dad’s tools in the garage to try and break it. When nothing works, Prompto manages to find out that the watch doesn’t tell time. Instead, it has a cylinder that shows silhouettes of… creatures. Upset that it doesn’t do anything, he presses down upon the all-black image of a dog-like animal, and suddenly has to adjust being a massive, blind dog that can rip apart cars.

> _ Dear Mr. Garrison, _
> 
> _ I’m afraid I’m home sick today because of a fever. The school already knows about my absence, and I would like to ask you for today’s class work and the homework. Linked below is the homework due today. _
> 
> _ Insomnian_History_HW_10-17.docx _
> 
> _ Thank you! _
> 
> _ Prompto Argentum _

With a miserable groan, Prompto flung himself down on his bed, carefully keeping his laptop balanced on his lap. He grabbed a tissue from his bedside table and blew his nose, rubbing at his watering eyes with the heels of his hands. His shortcut did cut down on the travel time, but stopping in the alley had gotten him further soaked and falling back into his bike and trash cans had probably led to him getting sick.

Admittedly, he’d exaggerated the claims of a fever in his emails. He had a head cold at worse, but he did need the day off, all things considered. Lifting his left wrist over his head, Prompto examined the watch that had firmly clamped itself onto his wrist. In his blind panic to get back home, he’d nearly ripped off his arm in his struggle to get it off. He was terrified that, if he left it alone, that he’d be missing his arm regardless, or that the circulation would stop, or that this was the red flag for aliens to pick him up in the middle of the night to abduct him.

But none of that had happened. Strung high on his nerves, Prompto had gone to bed way earlier than normal in nothing but his boxers without taking a shower, letting the germs fester on his skin. Low and behold, he woke up incredibly sick, but with a still-intact arm and the watch still clasped tight.

He tugged at it, feeling the skin and muscle move underneath but otherwise there was no change. The watch’s cheery green hourglass face peered back at him, almost tauntingly, and Prompto scowled. “You think you’re so smart, don’t you?”

The watch said nothing, because it was a watch. Prompto let his arms flop to the mattress, regretting taking the cold medicine earlier that day. It always made him a bit loopy, as evidenced by the fact that he was so desperate for conversation he was talking to the inanimate watch. His parents, as far as he knew, hadn’t come home last night, and they certainly weren’t around now. More often than not, he was left to his own devices for most, if not all of the day.

So that gave him free range to everything in the house. Forcing himself to his feet and ignoring the momentary disorientation that came with standing up with clogged sinuses, Prompto made his way downstairs and into the garage. Raising his watch-clad wrist in front of him, Prompto looked at the array of screwdrivers, pliers, and a multitude of other tools his father had for car maintenance. “Let’s see how long you’ll last against these guys.”

* * *

The answer was that the watch was nigh-indestructible, as evidenced by the destroyed glory that was his father’s tool collection.

The screwdrivers were either snapped, blunted, or twisted out of a usable shape. The pliers looked like they went to war against a Marlboro and lost. The wrenches had been pulled into half moons. While he could have gone to some of the power tools in desperation, Prompto didn’t want to resort to  cutting his wrist off. He was desperate, but not  _that_ desperate

He flopped, face down, onto the living room’s couch with a congested groan, sniffling miserably. Not only was the stupid watch still on his freaking wrist, but he’d wrecked most of his dad’s tools in the process. To add to that, most of those tools were pretty pricey, definitely up there in range, and he’d probably have to buy a whole slew of new ones to make up for it.

“There goes my last few paychecks.” He grumbled into the cushion, lifting his head up once he realized he couldn’t exactly breathe. He glared at the seemingly invincible watch, its face glowing back at him with its cheery, neon green light.

“What’s the point in having a watch that doesn’t even tell the time?” Prompto tapped one of the green lights around watch’s face, only to nearly throw himself off the couch when a cylinder popped up. The face spun slowly, the hourglass shape becoming a diamond, and a frantic, electronic beep started as a silhouette of a dog appeared.

Or, well, it  _ looked _ like a dog. Prompto couldn’t clearly make out a face, or a tail, but it looked hunched over and it was a silhouette. It made sense that he wouldn’t be able to make out some of the details.

“So, what, you’re just some stupid high-tech picture display?” He mused as he cautiously tapped the face. There was a light  _ tink _ as his nail hit the glass, but the beeping didn’t stop. Not knowing what else to do, Prompto pressed the cylinder back down, hoping that the irritating noise would stop.

There was a large flash of green, Prompto felt his entire body  _ move _ without moving, and he could see nothing but an endless abyss of black.

No, seriously, he couldn’t see anything. At  _ all. _ Prompto pushed himself onto his knees and lifted a hand in front of his face, waving it back and forth, nothing magically appearing. For a brief moment, he wondered he'd died, and he frantically moved to pat at his face, trying to see if something had inexplicably covered his eyes instead.

His hand met his face, and he nearly screamed. He could feel his lips, but that was it. His eyes and nose were inexplicably gone. He stood up, flailing his arms as his balance felt inexplicably _off,_ and he fell back onto his hands and knees, feeling that that was the most comfortable way to stand.

“What the—” Prompto cut himself off, swallowing and coughing to try and clear his throat because…

He tried to speak, form words, but all that left his throat was a series of growls and groans like it was from—from—

From something that  _ wasn’t human. _

Prompto gripped the carpet with sharp claws and  _ roared. _

* * *

Miss Clara (formally Mrs., bless her husband’s soul) was a portly old woman with a kind soul. Her house was clean—if you ignored the cat hair—and she lived next door to the Argentum household.

It was no secret that Rosa and Custos visited infrequently, leaving their son alone most, if not all of the time. Since Clara lived barely a house away from it, she took it upon herself to act as a foster mother. She called out to Prompto when he came hoe, invited the boy over to dinner some nights, asked him to do a few chores. She paid him, of course, but the real payoff was seeing his smiling face.

Yes, she had a large soft spot for the boy. Even her two cats, grumpy and incredibly wary of strangers, had come to love the boy’s gentle scratches.

Which was why, when she saw his bike still chained to his fence, she grew concerned. If the boy was in bed, sick and sweaty and oh-so-afraid, he wouldn’t be able to make any food for himself. She was halfway through standing when the howling started up. Her cats went into a frenzy, hissing and yowling and clawing at the windows, trying to find the source of the loud disturbance.

Clara sighed, remembering the awful storm. It wouldn’t surprise her if Prompto had found a dog, or some other animal, and brought it home to shelter it from the storm. Clara rapped her fingers against the arm of her chiar. It it were just that the dog sounded panicked, and she could hear Prompto trying to calm it, she would have let the issue be.

But she remembered the still-chained bike, remembered that Prompto could be terribly ill and stuck in his bed under sweaty sheets. She couldn’t get the image of some massive brute of a mutt slamming against the boy’s door, frothing at the mouth with crazed eyes.

Clara reached for a nearby phone, grabbed her Yellow Pages, and looked up the number for animal control.

* * *

_ This can’t be happening, oh Gods, this can’t be happening!  _ Prompto thought, panicked whines leaving his lips as he backed himself into a wall, body wracked with tremors. He was a giant, blind, dog monster  _ thing _ and he didn’t know how to fix himself.

Y'know, assuming that the could be fixed. He didn’t want to be a completely blind dog monster for the rest of his life—he  _ liked _ being able to see. And talk. And be an all-around human person that wasn’t a manically drooling dog monster. But for all he knew he'd just jumped off a bridge without even seeing the gap.

Another high-pitched whine left his throat, and Prompto snapped his mouth shut. He didn’t want to hear those sounds leaving him, because that wasn’t him, exactly—it was the dog monster that could make those noises. Prompto couldn’t, because he was a human, and not a dog monster, and  _ holy shit something on his neck just moved oh Shiva’s icy tits. _

It was probably innate instincts that prompted him into running. The new unfamiliar sensation combined with the large amount of panic would make anyone want to run, but throw that into the body of a blinded dog and it was a surprise he’d managed to hold still for so long.

Still, as he ran into his couch, that logic didn’t make the bump to his head hurt any less.

Prompto rubbed at the forming bruise with a grumble, trying to figure out where he was relative to the room. He was probably facing the right side of the couch, which meant the TV was to his right, the kitchen to his left, and the front entrance immediately behind him. In front of him, if he went around the couch, would be the back entrance. If he followed the wall behind him, he’d eventually make it to the staircase leading up to his room.

So… maybe he should go up to his room and try to hide for the rest of eternity? He certainly couldn’t go outside, he’d be killed for sure, mistaken for a common monster that had somehow slipped through the walls and shot dead by the Kingsglaive.

He shuddered, feeling his fur stand on end. Gods forbid  _ that _ happened.

But could he even trust himself going upstairs? He was one-hundred percent blind, and he was also about five times as wide as he normally was. What if he got stuck trying to go up the narrow staircase?

Well, first he’d die from embarrassment. Then he’d die from starvation or his parents coming home, whichever happened first.

Three quick bangs came from the front door, and this time Prompto actually  _ did _ yelp. The sound was as embarrassing as he thought it would sound—high pitched and very inhuman. The banging continued, this time getting a bit heavier, as someone tried the door handle. “Is anyone home?”

Prompto whined and moved away from the front door. He didn’t recognize the voice, and even if he  _ did, _ no one should be at his house, or banging on his door, or asking if anyone was home. Judging by the continued bangs and how they were desperately trying to open the door, they weren’t going to stop if he stayed quiet.

He was out of time.

Stumbling around the couch (and knocking over a fair amount of miscellaneous stuff in the process), Prompto reached for the back door. His long claws scrabbled against the glass before he finally grabbed the door handle, throwing it open.  With a satisfied huff, he pushed through the small gap and took off in a dead sprint. He didn't even stop as he collided with, and proceeded to run through, the wooden fence, the impact barely affecting him. He skidded and turned to the right, ignoring the various surprised shouts from behind him as he ran faster than he’d ever had in his life.

_ Well, of course you’re running faster, _ he thought.  _ You’re a giant godsdamned dog. _

And one of the problems that came with being a blind, giant dog was that Prompto had no idea where he was running. Sure, he had a mental map of all the pathways in his neighborhood—came with doing a paper route for a couple years before he started high school—but navigating the neighborhood while blind, taking longer strides at a faster speed, all while being  _ chased _ made it a bit difficult for him to remember where to turn.

Which was why he was only slightly surprised when he turned left, intending to turn down into a small gap between two buildings to circle back to his house, he instead rammed directly into a couple of trashcans.  The smell was suffocating, and he had to stop moving as it overwhelmed him. His nose was more sensitive than usual, even with the cold muddling everything, and it took a lot of willpower to not vomit. Once he collected himself, Prompto turned back to where he entered the alley. He couldn’t hear anyone nearby, but considering how much of a racket he made leaving the house and running around the neighborhood, they might still be chasing him.

_ Someone probably called animal control on me. _ The thought made Prompto chortle, the noise guttural and congested. He raised his hand and pressed it against the house he was next to. He knew that he wouldn’t be able to find any hints as to whose house he had stumbled across, but it helped to have a solid support.

Actually…

Experimentally, Prompto pulled his hand… paw…  _ thing _ back and then slapped it against the wall, keeping his fingers curled. His nails sunk into the plaster-coated bricks with ease and, he discovered with a tug, they held easily.

With a grin, Prompto turned to face the wall entirely and reared back on his hind legs. With his other hand, he repeated the motion, pulling himself up to scale the house. He didn’t stop until he reached the roof, stumbling about as he found the air conditioning unit and plopped behind it. Hidden as well as he could be, Prompto sighed and allowed himself to breathe.

The biggest concern was whether or not the change was permanent. If it was, then he was unabashedly screwed, because at one point or another he’d be caught and sent to a lab to be examined, or worse, dissected. The only one that knew about the watch was him, and even if someone else did know, he was the only one right now that the watch could do…  _ this. _

So that left him with two options: hiding away in his own home and hoping that his parents would never find him, or trying to make his way out of Insomnia. Given the base level of security that was infamous around the walls, he doubted he could make it out alive. Still, either option was better than being carted to a lab to be treated as an animal, only to die slowly and painfully.

A series of beeps came from Prompto’s left, and he scrambled to his feet, trying to figure out what it was. Before he could, there was a distinct flash of light, and there was a brief moment of disorientation as Prompto fell onto his butt. He groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose—

Wait.

He was  _ pinching _ the  _ bridge  of his  nose. _

Prompto’s eyes (glorious, _ glorious  _ eyes he would never take them for granted again) flew open, and he looked at his peach-colored hands. He had two arms, two legs, a whole torso and face, and there was not a speck of spindly fur on him.

“Yes!” He cheered, throwing his hands into the air before flopping back on the roof. Thank the Gods, oh, thank the Gods it wasn’t permanent. He was going to be  fine.

“Hey!” Prompto startled and abruptly sat up, meeting the gaze of a middle-aged man who he’d never seen before. “What the  hell are you doing on my roof?”

Prompto winced. Maybe  fine was too optimistic.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, the first alien selected is Wildmutt! He’s been a longtime favorite of mine: simplistic design and behavior, yet still kickass and unique!
> 
> \- In this AU, Wildmutt looks more like how he did in the original series, and is a blend between the 10-year-old version and the 30-year-old version seen in the episode _Ben 10,000._ The Omnitrix is located on Prompto’s shoulder, hence the time-out beeps occurring to his ‘left’. It was just on his arm and he couldn’t see it. He has a few darker-colored stripes running horizontally down his back. I was always disappointed that we never saw that design choice return…
> 
> \- The reason why Prompto can’t see, despite Wildmutt being completely capable of seeing without eyes, is simple: he has a cold. In the episode _Side Effects,_ we see how some of Ben’s aliens are affected by a simple cold virus. Of the three shown, Wildmutt was one of them, and it was confirmed that his ‘nostrils’ (the gill-like things on his neck) become clogged by mucus, rendering him blind. He can kind of hear, but he can’t smell properly allowing him to see. I made it so that he could kind of smell with the trash can scene, because even when sick, particularly strong or overpowering scents can still get through to people with a clogged nose.
> 
> \- The idea for Clara came from another fanfic on here, _Introductions._ Clara was mentioned to be a neighbor of Prompto's, who he would occasionally help move the garbage. The same basic premise is here, but I made Clara elderly and unable to keep going next door to watch him, though she still obviously cares.


	3. An Alien

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Scared of the watch stuck to his wrist, Prompto avoids using it out of fear of persecution. However, one dumb decision leads to the watch being activated once again, and Prompto gets turned into another creature. Somehow, he inadvertently makes a friend.

School had somehow become ten times worse with the watch. Prompto kept his shoulders hunched, trying to appear as small as possible as he walked through the halls. His left wrist, the one adorned with the eyesore of the watch, was either jammed deep into his blazer pocket or pressed to his side. A few eyes lingered on his new accessory in class, a question or a taunt hanging in the air before they turned back to something more important.

Prompto had never been more grateful to be a fly on the wall. No one bothered him about his jumpier-than-usual behavior, and no one questioned his new, odd accessory. He made it to Friday without incident, and his cold was finally starting to subside.

Which was why, when his luck ran out on Friday, he was only minimally surprised.

Prompto’s head slammed against the lockers and was held there by a meaty hand. The halls were empty, due to everyone eating lunch in the cafeteria or in their classrooms, so that meant Prompto and the semi-circle of jocks had a semblance of privacy.

Wonderful.

Abruptly let go, Prompto caught himself just before he fell to the floor. The jocks chuckled, letting Prompto pick himself up before the one to his left (what was his name? Scythas?) slammed his fist into Prompto’s gut. The wind was knocked out of him, and with a strained wheeze, he collapsed.

“What’s wrong, Argentum?” the jock that spoke placed his sneaker on Prompto’s back, pressing him to the floor. “Can’t get it up?”

Prompto wheezed in response, and the jocks laughed.

For a split second, he considered turning the watch on and changing into the dog monster to watch (or, well, listen in his case) as their taunts turned into terrified screams. It’d be justified karma after all the shit he’d taken from them over the years. With narrowed eyes, Prompto pressed the green bulb on the edge of the watch’s face, the cylinder popping up and the frantic beeps starting—

“What’re you doing?” The unfamiliar voice made them all pause, and the pressure on Prompto’s back lightened as the jocks turned to who had spoken. There were a few shocked gasps, and the foot left his back completely.

Prompto took a deep breath, but didn’t dare move as the jocks addressed the new person. “None of your business.”

“I think it is.” Footsteps drew closer to Prompto, and a few of the jocks backed away. “And I think you should leave.”

The jocks lingered for a moment, weighing the pros and cons, before turning around and walking away. Prompto remained frozen on the ground for a second longer, not fully comprehending what had happened. Someone… someone had stepped in to help him, and had kind of chased away his bullies, if only for the day.

And then he realized that the watch was still activated, beeping frantically on his wrist, cylinder raised and ready to be pressed down and turn him into a frothing dog monster that could scale buildings easily.

Oh, _shit…_

“Hey,” The person asked right next to him. Prompto startled, and his eyes flicked up to see messy black hair and deep blue eyes. “Are you—?”

Prompto didn’t hang around, jumping to his feet and bolting for the staircase leading to the roof. He ignored the panicked shout behind him, protecting his wrist as he pushed open the door and ducked behind the walls next to the wall. He frantically twisted the cylinder, pressing the bulbs and other extensions, anything to try and get it to stop beeping and turn off.

The only change he could see was that the silhouette on the watch face changed. “No. No, no, no _gods,_ why? I take it back, I didn’t want to punch them as the dog thing, it was a heat of the moment thing, just _please_ turn this stupid thing off!”

The doors to the roof opened, and Prompto spun around. In doing so, his wrist hit the wall, pushing the cylinder down. A flash of green light engulfed him just as his ‘savior’ burst through the doors, and Prompto cursed the name of every God he could think of.

* * *

Noctis burst through the rooftop doors, running out onto the roof before skidding to a stop. He looked around, cursing when he couldn’t see the other teen he’d helped. It wasn’t often that Noctis helped someone, preferring to keep any school drama as far away from his as possible, so he kind of wanted to see if the guy was alright. Least the guy could do for him was wait around and assure him that nothing was wrong.

But of course, the guy had disappeared—probably into some room on the third floor, or a hidden alcove that only he knew how to find. Noctis scoffed and put his hands into his pockets, turning to go back to his empty classroom and eat his lunch.

Or, that’s what he _would_ have done, had he not seen something very small and very green trying to open the doors leading back in. Noctis froze, taking in the sight of a… _creature_ that was half a head tall, struggling to pull the doors open, complete with strained grunts. Had it not been so bizarre, Noctis would have laughed at it.

But instead he blinked, taking a step back in shock, and the creature apparently noticed. It turned to look at him, eyes comedically widening in shock. “Uh oh.”

Before Noctis could get a word out, the creature had swung and leapt from the door, running away from Noctis and toward the edge of the roof. Putting on the ‘hero act’ once again, Noctis shot forward, incorporating a bit of warping into the maneuver so he could move silently, and grabbed the creature in a tight fist. His other hand skidded against the rooftop, slowing their momentum before they both tumbled off.

The creature screamed—the sound was high pitched, and grated on Noctis’ ears—before it leaned over his hand and sank surprisingly sharp teeth into his index finger.

Admittedly, it didn’t hurt. Noctis had been knocked on his ass more times than he could care to count from training with Gladio and Cor, so the bite was barely a blip on his radar. It was shock that made him drop the creature, putting pressure on the shallow wounds as he flung the creature away. It skipped along the ground, like a stone on water, before rolling to a stop and groaning. “Ow…”

Noctis could only stare as the creature picked itself up, dusting its… jumper suit? It looked at Noctis, blinking at him with embarrassment as it shuffled its feet awkwardly. At a loss of something to say, Noctis managed to get out, “You can talk?”

The creature’s eyes narrowed, and it crossed its arms. “No, you’re just hearing the madness settle in the longer you look at me. I’m really a voice inside your head.”

Noctis narrowed his own eyes. “I could just, y’know, throw you off the roof.”

The creature paused, then carefully swallowed, letting its arms fall to its sides. “Let’s not do that.”

“Yeah.” Noctis sat down on the roof, bending slightly to try and get to the creature’s level. Even then, he was still too tall. “So… do you have a name?”

“Uh…” The creature also sat down, and it twiddled with its fingers anxiously. “Not… really?”

Noctis shrugged. “Okay, so, are you a boy?”

“Of course I am!”

“Sorry, it’s just… hard to tell.” Noctis flushed and looked away, brushing some of his hair behind his ear. “So, if you don’t have a name, does that mean I can just make something up to call you by?”

“Only if it isn’t stupid.”

Noctis hummed and drummed his fingers against his jaw. He tilted his head, narrowing his eyes at the creature, who shifted under the scrutiny. “How about… small fry?”

“Look, I know you’re the prince and all, but if you start calling me small fry I _will_ bite you.”

“Ooh, I could try you for treason, then.”

“Good luck. I’m an alien fugitive under witness protection. I’ve got immunity.”

“Are you?” The creature blinked at the question, and Noctis clarified. “The whole ‘alien witness protection’ thing.”

“Nah, I’m pulling your leg.” The affirmation came out shaky, slightly uneasy, but he didn’t push. The whole situation was weird enough, and it would be easy to misconstrue a joke as something serious.

“Okay then, back to naming.” His shoulders sagged in relief, and Noctis smiled at the lack of tension between them. “How about Andy?”

_“Andy?”_

“Yeah, I mean… it kind of sounds like ‘ant’.”

The creature narrowed his eyes at Noctis, but sighed in defeat. “Since that’s probably the most normal name you can think up, I think that should be the one we go with.”

Noctis grinned and sat up, mock-clearing his throat and adding a Tenbraen accent to his voice. “By the royal powers vested in me, I now dub the Andy of Lucis. If I had a sword and were not afraid to cut your limbs off, I would tap thine shoulders with a sword, but for now you should simply take my word for this holy event, Andy of Lucis.”

Andy snickered and covered his mouth with his hand. “Dude, seriously?”

“What?” Noctis grinned, letting the somewhat lazy drawl return to his voice. “I thought you’d like it.”

“I do but… c’mon, we’re on top of a school roof, sitting twenty feet apart, talking about naming me _something_ other than froggo.”

Noctis snapped his fingers. “Damn, should’ve gone with that.”

Andy moved to retort, but he’s interrupted as his stomach rumbles. It was almost inaudible, like hearing a phone buzz with a notification under seven piles of clothes, but in the relative silence of the rooftop the sound was pronounced. Andy flushed (at least, that’s what Noctis assumed had happened when his gray cheeks darkened a few shades), and Noctis barely held back a laugh. “You hungry?”

“Shut up.” Came the mumbled response. Noctis rose to his feet and put his hand out in front of Andy. He eyed the proffered hand with suspicion, and eventually met Noctis’ gaze. “Uh…?”

“I’ve got food down in my classroom. You can hide out there until school lets out, and then I can drop you off wherever you need to go.”

“How do you know that I don’t just live here, like a… like a guardian gnome?”

Noctis shrugged, a faint but genuine smile on his face. “No offense, but I personally doubt you live in the school building. And even if you did, the school cafeteria is a bloodbath ‘round now.”

Andy looked at his hand, then up at Noctis, then back to his hand. Finally, the tiny creature stepped onto his hand, and Noct placed him in his blazer pocket. “Alright then, to the second floor.”

* * *

Of all the things Prompto expected, this was nowhere on his scale of expected things.

He expected to be stomped on. He expected to be thrown off a roof. He expected to be ripped apart like a wishbone. He expected to be squashed by the _Prince of freaking Lucis’_ bookbag because apparently, his savior was the _godsdamned Prince._

Instead, he’d been given kindness, patience and care, and a free lunch that was _stupidly_ good. The Prince had to have his own personal chef or something because this was gourmet stuff.

“By all means,” Noctis had said, pushing chopped-up bits of carrots towards him. “Chow down. _I’m_ certainly not eating it.”

And maybe he should’ve been a bit more careful about that, because he’s some weird frog thing and maybe carrots weren’t the best thing to eat, but dammit, Prompto was hungry. Plus, it tasted _ridiculously_ good, better than any fast food or leftovers or whatever Clara managed to bring to him that week out of the kindness of her heart. This could potentially be a one-time deal, and he was going to enjoy it while he could.

The dismissal bell felt like it rang too soon, and Prompto jolted on Noctis’ desk. The Prince swore, and opened the flap on his bag, taking out a few books while hastily shoving his somewhat-completed lunch in. “Hop in.”

“Seriously?” The question was somewhat redundant, considering that Prompto was already climbing into it, but it was appropriate. He didn’t know what Noctis’ classes were to a tee, just that he shared eight periods with him and then they went their separate ways during ninth, and really didn't want to sit through whatever his last period was.

“Unless you want to be thrown around in my pocket.” Noctis whispered back. He furtively glanced at the door before digging his phone out of his pants pocket and handing it off to Prompto. “Here, play an app or something while I die from boredom.”

“You’re giving me your phone?” Prompto almost didn’t want to take it, afraid to get dirt on the _very_ expensive and _very_ new phone that he wasn’t even sure if it was on the market or not yet.

(He also noted, with a tiny bit of spite, that the phone was both wider and taller than he was. Prompt was going to blame the size difference on the fact that the new phone model was ridiculously large, and nothing else.)

“So long as you don’t call anyone, I don’t care what you do, and there shouldn’t be any consequences. I think.” Noctis glanced up and saw the class filing in, letting his bag’s flap fall.

Prompto’s eyes adjusted to the near-darkness quickly, and he scowled up in Noctis’ general direction. “You sure know how to instill confidence in people.”

Still, he had a source of entertainment for the next two periods, and the battery wasn’t doing too bad. He unlocked the phone, momentarily surprised at the lack of a password before looking at any of the gaming apps. There were a few time-killer apps—mindless actions that racked up meaningless points for when you just had nothing to do but sit on a toilet—but one app quickly caught his attention.

King’s Knight.

Prompto nearly burst into manic giggles. The Prince of Lucis was not only a gamer, but had one of the most popular MMO gaming apps on his phone! He could only imagine how tricked out his avatar would be: he probably blew a fair amount of money on some of the in-app currency for the high-level gear, and a fair amount of money was probably a nickel in comparison to what the Prince could afford.

He opened the app with glee, already swearing to himself that he wouldn’t touch anything that cost money. He would do the daily missions and get as far as he could on the free stuff, boosting the Prince’s probably sky-high level while getting some entertainment out of it himself. The app loaded sluggishly, probably inhibited by the lack of Wi-Fi, but when it did…

Prompto was almost disappointed. Noct (who had donned the username _iamthenight)_ was just barely about to hit level fifteen, and had the standard armor that provided no buffs. He had in-game cash, sure, but it was meager, and certainly not enough to buy the ridiculously OP armor that was being displayed for 30% off.

So, the Prince was either a new player, or a long-timer that didn’t really care about the game.

Prompto shrugged and went into the storyline quests. At least he had something to do, and plenty of time to kill

* * *

Noctis sighed as his Economics class ended, students scrambling to leave the room to make the walk home or get on their bus. The teacher sighed, going at a slightly subdued pace, but Noctis still waited until the graying man had left before he grabbed his own bag and opened the flap.

Andy stuck his head out, propping his arms over the leather and holding out Noctis’ phone. “You have the most boring, long-winded classes _ever.”_

“Trust me, I know.” Noctis took the phone as Andy hopped out of his bag, letting him put in his books. “Where do you want me to drop you off?”

Andy worried his bottom lip before replying. “Just stop by the bike racks? I can figure it out from there.”

Noctis grinned. “You don’t have a homely shoe I can drop you off at?”

“Haha, very funny.” Andy deadpanned, choosing to leap onto Noctis’ blazer and place himself in his pocket. Noctis filed away the information that the little guy could climb walls for later—when he could duck into the library and figure out what the hell he really was.

Still, he had places to be, and getting lost in his own thoughts helped no one. Regardless of whatever he could find, Andy had proven to be friendly and more approachable than all the other students at school, and he didn’t want to lose that any time soon. Ignis would be here any second to pick him up, and if he didn’t hurry, then Andy would have to try and survive in the Citadel. He gently patted the pocket Andy was in, somewhat satisfied to hear his annoyed grunt. “Ready?”

“Whenever you are.”

Noctis walked out of class, slinging his leather bag over his shoulder and did his best to act nonchalant. Thankfully, most people avoided him in the halls, either because they knew he was stubbornly unapproachable or they were simply caught up in the excitement of going home. He made it to the front entrance without any incident, and he felt Andy squirm and peek out as much as he could in his pocket to look out.

There were still a few stragglers, but it wasn’t the flood of students that had left once the bell rang. Noctis felt Andy tap at his hip, and he hummed in acknowledgement. “Bring me closer to the brick wall, I’ll figure it out from there.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah, I’ll be fine. I think I can get home without getting crushed.” There was a bit of humor in his voice, and Noctis allowed a small smile to appear on his face, trying not to let his concern for his small friend cloud his judgement.

Without another word, Noct drifted right, going as close to the brick wall as he dared. Already, he could see the slick black exterior of Ignis’ car waiting for him by the road, and he slowed his pace, giving Andy ample time to get out before he would be called away by Ignis.

There was a slight jolt at his hip, and Noctis instinctively glanced down, seeing Andy land on the brick wall and start scaling it like a godsdamned spider. In a few seconds, he’d reached the top, and had pulled himself up, shaking his hands free of dust and other dirt. He turned to look at Noctis and grinned, waving. “See ya!”

And then he jumped behind the wall, out of Noctis’ sight.

He pouted. He didn’t even get to say goodbye. He was half tempted to shout over the brick wall, or maybe throw a pencil at Andy to make him come back, even if it was over something so simple.

“Noct.” Ignis’ prim voice came from the road. He’d been spotted.

Noctis scoffed and turned, heading to the opened passenger’s side door.

…He really wanted to say goodbye.

He climbed into the passenger’s seat without any fanfare, just letting out a typical sigh and falling back, letting the knots in his back work themselves out. A few seconds later, Ignis entered the driver’s seat and started the car. The engine purred, and with the ease of a seasoned driver, he pulled away from the school and started to drive to the Citadel. “Anything interesting happen today?”

_Yeah,_ he thought, _I met a frog man and he’s officially my first friend that_ isn’t _tied to some form of royalty and now I’ll probably never see him again because he’s some stupid monster fairy thing like Carbuncle that I don’t know how to contact._

“Nothing really.” He said, and pulled out his phone. He checked his emails, then his texts and call history. A part of him was surprised to see that nothing had been messed with, no prank calls or texts to his father or anyone in his half-formed royal retinue. His internet history didn’t have any weird links, and the tabs he had open had been left alone.

Bored out of his mind, he opened up King’s Knight, waiting for the app to sluggishly load, and blinked in surprise.

His dailies had been collected, and some of the story quests had been completed. His character’s level had risen considerably and his weak gear had been traded for slightly better, slightly higher-level stuff. His cash hadn’t been messed with, either.

And, in the top right corner, he saw the inbox icon flashing. Out of sheer boredom, he clicked it, expecting to see a notice for a limited time deal for the in-game currency, to be quickly deleted.

Instead, he got a pop up that read, “Friend Request to xXchocobabe83 has been accepted! Click HERE to start a chat!”

Stunned, he tapped the highlighted link, a blank board appearing with a section at the bottom for typing. Noctis’ character icon was in the bottom left, while xXchocobabe83’s was in the top right. It was a male with blond hair done in a wild fashion, and he could see a bit of light armor in the profile image.

Still, as far as Noctis could remember, he hadn’t sent out any friend requests. He was more than content to play the game solo, only interacting with others if they sent him a jovial reply on the public messaging board. So…

With a bit of trepidation, Noct tapped the section at the bottom and typed out a simple question.

**iamthenight:** andy?

Noctis waited, jiggling his leg rapidly as he waited for a reply. When the app pinged with a new message, he nearly jumped out of his skin and jumped out of his skin. With a faint blush on his cheeks, he ignored Ignis’ pointed look and quickly put his phone on silent.

**xXchocobabe83:** yup!

**xXchocobabe83:** sorry i added u on impulse

**xXchocobabe83:** i understand if u dont want 2 talk

Noctis almost broke into hysterical giggles. Apparently, the small frog man also played King’s Knight with a more-embarrassing username than what he’d came up with.

Gods, what had happened in his life to make that sentence normal?

**iamthenight:** no it’s fine! i don’t mind talking

**iamthenight:** i just wasn’t expecting your username to be that

**xXchocobabe83:** lyk ur username is any cooler :p

**iamthenight:** i’d argue that it is

**iamthenight:** why is THAT your username??

**xXchocobabe83:** i made the account 3 years ago and i was v emotionally repressed

**xXchocobabe83:** also i was in the middle of my ‘LAWL SO RANDUM’ phase

**xXchocobabe83:** the only reason i kept is is bc of sentimentality

**iamthenight:** ok but…

**iamthenight:** why babe and the 83?

**xXchocobabe83:** the 83 looks lyk a face

**xXchocobabe83:** and chocochick, chocochic, and chocobaby was taken w/ xX and 83

**xXchocobabe83:** apparently its a pop un

**iamthenight:** i take it you like chocobos, then?

**xXchocobabe83:** bruh

**xXchocobabe83:** my luv 4 chocobos is stronger than all the forces in the universe

Noctis grinned and leaned back until he was sinking into the passenger’s seat. His fingers glided over the keyboard, easy banter going back and forth between him and Andy.

It was almost embarrassing, now that he thought about it. He’d been regularly attending high school for little more than a month, and the only person he could make kind-of-friends with was a bipedal frog with fangs. Even then, he was certain that the meeting would be a one time thing, and that he’d never see Andy again, but here he was, talking to him via a shitty messaging option in a mobile app.

He laughed, unsure if it was aimed at himself or the ridiculous series of events that had transpired.

“Something wrong, Noct?” Ignis asked behind the wheel, eyes flicking to Noctis’ phone before centering on the road again.

“Nah.” Noctis placed his phone in his blazer pocket—the same pocket Andy had resided in. “Just… stuff.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> \- Originally, this chapter and Grey Matter’s introduction was going to be much, MUCH different. Prompto was going to check out the watch at home, becoming a bit more confident with it, and turn into Grey Matter and essentially get stuck in his room when his parents come home. I decided to scrap it for a plot idea that would happen in chapter 3, because I wanted Noctis and Prompto to have some level of interaction before the next part of the series (yes this is gonna be a slow burn folks!)
> 
> \- The idea for this chapter also came from an original Ben 10 episode, ~~A Small Problem.~~ The Omnitrix turns Ben into Grey Matter for a long period of time after he messes with it, and has to escape an obsessed nerd’s house. It’s worth the watch, if you’ve got time, because you get to see Ben struggle to use an alien he rarely ever uses.
> 
> \- My personal ideas for King’s Knight actually comes from the Kingdom Hearts series (aka I desperately want to see my boys in KH3 pls square). There are a lot of console games, each one better than the last with a few spin-offs important to plot, with a online multiplayer mobile prequel game.
> 
> \- I headcanon that Noctis was primarily home schooled after the Marilith attack, but that he had gone to school for a couple months before then (which was when he met Prompto). He started going to high school once his father knew he had some level of combat training and that he would be able to take the physical and mental strain.


	4. Device Did

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ‘Andy’s’ relationship with the Prince improves, much to Prompto’s panic. Along with that, Prompto finally has a long overdue chat with the jocks from school, and realizes just how much harm he can do if he isn't careful.

**iamthenight:** so, like, where do you live?

**xXchocobabe83:** ????ummmmm???

**iamthenight:** NO OH MY GODS NOT LIKE THAT

**iamthenight:** shit, that could’ve been worded better

**iamthenight:** i meant ‘where do you live’ as in ‘do you live in a house’

**xXchocobabe83:** of course i live in a house where tf else would i live???

**iamthenight:** ...the sewers?

**xXchocobabe83:** wow

**iamthenight:** ok but can you blame me?

**xXchocobabe83:** WOOOOOOOW

**iamthenight:** stfu andy i had good intent

**xXchocobabe83:** i almost want 2 pretend u were hmu bc thats BETTER than that question

**iamthenight:** FUCK OFF

* * *

**iamthenight:** so what are your parents like?

**xXchocobabe83:** uh……...

**iamthenight:** too personal?

**xXchocobabe83:** no its just hard 2 describe ppl u dont see often

**iamthenight:** ...oh

**xXchocobabe83:** fuck did i just send that???

**xXchocobabe83:** fuck me please ignore that

**xXchocobabe83:** my parents are fine!

**xXchocobabe83:** really!

**xXchocobabe83:** everythings cool!

**xXchocobabe83:** ...noctis?

**iamthenight:** so are they also two tiny frog people or…?

**xXchocobabe83:** no theyre normal human ppl w jobs

**iamthenight:** so basically…

**iamthenight:** you truly are the smallest small man to have ever smalled

**xXchocobabe83:** omg SHUT UP DUDE >:P

* * *

**iamthenight:** so ok

**iamthenight:** let’s say that i maybe don’t want to eat something in my lunch

**iamthenight:** where could i leave the food/meet you to give you the food

**xXchocobabe83:** omg dude r u srs?

**iamthenight:** i mean, yeah?

**iamthenight:** i’m not going to eat like, half the shit iggy made for me

**iamthenight:** vegetables suck man

**xXchocobabe83:** r u srsly asking me 2 eat ur veggies 4 u (¬_¬) 

**iamthenight:** i mean yeah. i’m not gonna eat them and you seemed to like it

**xXchocobabe83:** yeah bc its free gourmet food!

**iamthenight:** that’s gourmet for you?

**xXchocobabe83:** i get by typically on a minimum wage salary so yeah thats gourmet

**xXchocobabe83:** also it was tasty as hell ytf do u not like it???

**iamthenight:** ok now i HAVE to give you the food

**iamthenight:** and veggies taste like shit no matter what 

**iamthenight:** where do i put it

**xXchocobabe83:** idk???

**xXchocobabe83:** the roof i guess? i can get it easily there and maybe we can talk?

**iamthenight:** awesome, i’ll drop it off tomorrow for you. see you at lunch!

**xXchocobabe83:** cya!

* * *

_ Oh Gods, I’m catfishing the Prince. _

The revelation smacked Prompto in the face as he was brushing his teeth, and he nearly choked on his spittle-toothpaste mix. The messageboard on his King’s Knight app was filled with a massive wall of light hearted banter and jokes that often continued long into the night, Noctis’ curt sarcasm made its way into a few of his jokes, and Prompto had responded with his own mock-offended tone.

Except the Prince didn’t know he was talking to Prompto. He thought he was talking to a freaky frog man-creature-thing that wasn’t regularly sitting next to him in most of his high school classes.

_ Fuck, _ Prompto thought as he lowered his toothbrush and spat out the toothpaste, moving through the rest of his morning routine in a haze.

“Fuck.” He groaned under his breath as he arrived at school,  his stomach flipping upon seeing the sleek black car that belonged to the Prince pull up next to the school.

And as he sat down in class, only for one of the jocks to sit directly in front of him, turn around, and draw an imaginary line across his neck, all Prompto could do was put his head in his hands and think to himself,  _ I am so fucked. _

* * *

Considering the various death stares Prompto received throughout the day, it was a miracle that nothing had happened yet. He expected to be jumped as he was walking from class to the bathroom in between third and fourth period, but either the Gods had decided to give him a lucky break or the jocks weren’t about to jump him in the bathroom.

Of course, shit was bound to hit the fan sooner or later.

Going at a full-tilt sprint, Prompto had about half a hallway of space between him and the jocks chasing him. While that sounded great, only three were behind him, and Prompto didn’t know where the rest were hiding. For all he knew, they were just trying to herd him into a specific room to beat the shit out of him.

So Prompto did what he did best—he banked right and ran up the stairs to the roof, spinning around the small protrusion before ducking behind it. The solution was temporary, and he had no real way of keeping the door closed, but it gave him a second to think.

If he was quick enough, then he might be able to duck past them, back down the stairs, and then out the front door to wait out the rest of lunch. However, most of the guys were pretty beefy, hard to run around, and built like brick walls; one misstep, and he’ll be covered in bruises and possibly nursing a couple broken ribs. He couldn’t trick them with some noise or something from his phone, because he’d lose his phone. Buying a new one was out of the question with his budget, and he didn’t want them to mess with any of his social accounts.

“Godsdammit.” He whispered and brought his head back to rest against the brick wall. He didn’t have any other options, and had essentially cornered himself into an ass kicking.

…Unless…

Prompto looked at the watch on his wrist and pressed the green bulb. The cylinder popped up with little preamble, and with a gentle grip, Prompto began to twist the face. There were obviously more creatures on this thing than just the dog creature and ‘Andy’, so maybe he’d be able to find something that could help him out. The odds were slim, but if he could find something, _anything..._

He paused on the image of an insectoid silhouette, boasting jagged wings and toothpick legs. For a moment, he hesitated, hand raised above the watch. Was this what he really wanted to do?

The wall behind him vibrated as the jocks climbed the stairs, their footsteps heavy as they took them two at a time. Prompto closed his eyes as he slammed his hand down, letting the light engulf him as his body went through the skin-tingling process of changing. It was painless, minus the disorientation, but even that was starting fade.

Prompto breathed, letting his chest expand and contract, and opened one of his eyes, then the other… and the other and the other.

Apparently he had four eyes now. Weird.

The doors to the roof slammed open behind him, and Prompto turned, taking in some of his body as he went. His stomach plummeted when he realized that he was just as big, if not a bit bigger, than he was before. Part of the reason he’d selected the bug was because he assumed that he’d be tin not gargantuan, so he could make a quick getaway. He certainly hadn't wanted to be the freaking Godzilla of bugs!

Regardless, he could see the thin wings behind him, pointing straight into the air. They were translucent with a green tint, and blurred as he flapped them (which was a whole ‘nother sensation which he was not going to think about too deeply, because he was freaking out enough as is). He had two additional legs, sharpened to a point, and a long tail that ended with a massive stinger.

“Argentum!” Shouted one of the jocks, and Prompto jumped at the noise. “You can’t hide forever, shithead!”

“Good thing I’m not hiding…” Prompto whispered. Like the other transformations, his voice had changed, and was arguably the highest-pitched of the bunch so far. He turned away from the jocks, beating his wings a bit more while worrying his bottom lip. He didn’t doubt that he could fly, but _actually_ taking off, flying around Insomnia… it was _terrifying._ Humans weren’t meant to fly for a reason, and now he was less than a second from being able to do so. 

_ Breathe, just… breathe. _ Prompto shook with a mix of fear and adrenaline as he looked up at the sky. He could hear the blood pumping through his veins, and he furled and unfurled his claw-like fingers as his wings felt impossibly heavy. He should go—he  _ needed _ to go—because if he doesn’t hurry then the jocks are going to beat the everloving shit out of him.

_ “Here _ pussy pussy pussy.” Prompto’s shoulders tensed at Scythas’ high pitched call, the other jocks laughing along.  _ “Here _ pussy pussy pussy, come out to pla-ay.”

Prompto grit his teeth and turned to face them. What was he doing, just running away? Here he was, having an arsenal of  _ things _ that could do Astrals-know-what to these dicks, and he was just going to run away from an issue that wasn’t going to ever stop? He’d been told, all his life, that giving people a response was how they got their fun, and that it was better to leave it alone and to, "Keep your head down, Prompto." 

But right now… right now, he wasn’t Prompto. Right now, he was a giant bug with a scythe-pincer-thingy on his tail that could fly. It wouldn’t be Prompto giving them a rise, it would be the whole lot of them being terrified at the giant bug about to eat them. And if worse came to worse, and he couldn’t handle them, he could always fly away after giving them all a good scare.

Prompto pressed closer to the ground with a grin. He waited for a lull in the jock’s taunts to eventually call out in a shaky, tearful tone, “L-Leave me alone!”

Dead air hovered over the rooftop, and for a moment, Prompto was filled with every doubt he had about doing this. Fuck, he shouldn’t have even spoken, his voice was probably too distorted for them to recognize him, and the jig was up—

The one of the jocks was moving, steps loud but slow as they approached his hiding spot. Scythas’ voice came further away, and Prompto could hear the smug victory in his tone. “And what are you gonna do about it, Prince Whore?”

Prompto frowned, letting his wings beat fast enough to get just a little bit of lift off the ground until he was barely hovering. He let the low buzz permeate the air before he spoke up, letting his voice grow more pronounced. “Wow, of  _ all _ the insults I’ve ever heard, that one…”

He darted around the corner, accidentally slamming into the approaching jock, who was a lot closer than he’d anticipated. To his surprise, the jock was thrown back, and Prompto barely felt the rebound. He recovered quickly, rising higher in the air, letting the sunlight hit his stinger and show off his sharp legs. “...Has got to be one of the  _ dumbest _ insults I’ve ever heard.”

The jocks scrambled back, one of them even screaming as they saw him. Prompto grinned as his four eyes took in Scythas’ terrified expression with glee. “W-What the fuck are you?”

Prompto’s delight only grew at the slight tremor in his voice, but he reigned himself in. He wanted to scare the jocks away, not show off and get them riled up and ready for a fight. “I’m something that you should be very,  _ very _ afraid of,  _ snack.” _

A tanner jock, skinny as a twig, dared to draw closer, fists raised. “Who’re you to talk? You’re just some nasty-ass bug!”

“Funny, that’s what the last guy said.” Prompto’s stinger vaguely gestured behind him. “That stringbean wasn’t satisfying at all. I’m glad you were all so concerned about him to run up here after him, now I can eat an _actual_ meal.”

Scythas scowled and stood taller, but took a step back. “Oh yeah? Who says we’re gonna go down without a fight?”

Prompto frowned and hovered in the air slightly. “Who said you have a chance?”

The tan jock charged, probably going to try and get a running leap off to drag him down. Before he could get any closer, however, Prompto dove down and knocked his legs out from underneath him. He spun in midair and grabbed the back of the jock’s jacket and spun him and threw him into two other jocks, toppling the three of them onto their backs.

Someone behind him yelled, and Prompto’s eyestalks twisted around (without his permission and  _oh Astrals_ that felt so freaking  _weird)_ so that they looked behind him. The jock charging at him with a bat froze, a vaguely disgusted expression crossing his face. It gave Prompto enough time to hover backwards and spin, slamming the flat end of his pincer into the jock’s side and into one of the rooftop doors. His grip on the baseball bat had slipped, and it rolled to a stop at Scythas’ feet.

The other jocks quickly backed off, only Scythas staying close. His eyes were wide, and his hands were trembling a bit, but he tried to but on a tough facade. “You think you’re such tough shit, aren’t you, bug boy?”

“I mean…” He gestured at the other jocks. _“I_ don’t, but all of  _ you _ do.”

Scythas’ face hardened and picked up the bat in a single, smooth motion. He hefted it over his shoulder, wiggling it and testing its weight. “Yeah, but just because you’re tough doesn’t mean you’re smart, asshole.”

The buzz of Prompto’s wings raised in volume, either because he was angry or it was an instinctual need to rise higher in the air upon seeing a threat. Regardless, Prompto was yanked to the ground by a strong grip on his stinger, and he could help but shout in pain at the weird tugging sensation travelling up his spine. Scythas grinned and stalked closer, making a show of how he held the bat over his shoulder. Prompto tried beating his wings harder, pulling up into the air, then wildly strafing side to side.

Nothing. Whoever had the grip on his tail wasn’t about to let up for the world, and Prompto didn’t want to actually hurt him or anyone involved. Still, getting his head smashed in from a baseball bat wasn’t exactly the greatest thing either, but he couldn’t move out of the way. Prompto felt bile rise in his throat, and he swallowed it down, meeting Scythas’ almost bloodthirsty stare.

But the bile kept rising, and eventually it reached a point where swallowing became a struggle. He was half tempted to vomit directly onto Scythas’ face, but instead, he tilted his head a little to the left and did his best to aim for the bat.

Immediately Prompto knew that whatever left his mouth wasn’t bile. It left an unpleasant stinging sensation as it left his lips, and the air around it seemed to shudder as steam rolled off the substance in waves. Upon hitting the bat, the substance hissed adamantly, and Scythas dropped it, letting it clatter to the floor. Before their very eyes, the wooden bat began to disintegrate, until it was in a pile of burnt and oddly-melted wooden chips.

“What the  _ fuck?” _

“That thing spits acid?”

“Oh screw this shit, I’m out!”

Prompto didn’t notice when the grip on his tail had been released, but in what felt like seconds, the roof had been vacated, and he was the sole occupant. Prompto carefully lowered himself to the ground, the tips of his legs clicking as he settled, eyes never leaving the melted bat. Some of the concrete around it had been burnt, small dips appearing wherever the acid had landed in small droplets.

If he hadn’t moved his head, if he was aiming at Scythas, or if Scythas had decided to pull back to swing…

Prompto shuddered, half tempted to pick up the remains of the bat and throw them off the roof, like discarding the evidence of a murder.

No! No, there wasn’t a murder, and no one had been hurt (except for those few other guys, but they had bruises at worse), so Prompto was fine. He was fine! Everything was fine! 

But…

But he needed, beyond a shadow of a doubt, to go (like he should’ve done ten minute ago).

* * *

Four loud, grating beeps and a blinding flash of red light signaled Prompto’s transformation back to himself. He barely flinched as his body adjusted to the lack of wings, tail, and additional legs, somewhat numb to everything around him. Prompto—normal, human Prompto—sat in the corner of his bed, pressed against the wall as he held an old Chocobo plushie to his chest. He’d occasionally squeeze it, trying to find that little voice box that had been put in its wing, trying to get the nearly-decade old device to work.

It was an old comfort. When his parents started to leave home more and more frequently, they gave him the Chocobo plushie on his fifth birthday, and told him that it would keep the nightmares and bad people away. It helped, though it was never a replacement for his parents, and it did keep him calm and collected in most situations.

And, as Prompto was learning, it still worked. The longer he sat there, only focusing on the slightly scratchy faux-feathers brushing against his bare arms, the calmer his mind became. He didn’t have to focus on the could’ve beens, or what might’ve happened, he just had to focus on the Chocobo and his breathing.

Feeling significantly calmer compared to when he shakily flew to his house and nearly broke his bedroom window trying to get in, Prompto risked taking out his phone. There were no text or call notifications, or any news on a giant mutant bug flying over the city, and as far as his small collection of news apps were reporting. The only notifications that were apparent were from King’s Knight, though a few were the standard ‘Don’t forget to collect your gold!’ reminders.

Opening the app, Prompto realized just how many notifications he  _ actually _ had, the messenger icon flashing red. A pit of dread settled in his stomach as he clicked it, seeing the numerous notifications from Noctis pop up.

**iamthenight:** hey were you at the school today?

**iamthenight:** apparently some shit went down with the jocks and they’re telling everyone to steer clear of the roof

**iamthenight:** school staff is keeping us away from there so i can’t bring the food up

**iamthenight:** too bad none of them can warp! see ya suckers i’m sneaking up there 8th

**iamthenight:** holy shit

**iamthenight:** there’s, like, a puddle of sludge here with a decayed bat sitting in it

**iamthenight:** fuck did you steal stuff from the science wing and make an acid bomb?

**iamthenight:** andy are you there?

**iamthenight:** seriously dude, the fact that you haven’t responded at all is kinda worrying

**iamthenight:** did whatever that used the acid get you?

**iamthenight:** andy please respond i’m genuinely freaking out now

**iamthenight:** that bat looked like a half-aborted catepillar and i’m kindof desperately hoping that most of that goop isn’t you

**iamthenight:** andy seriously i’m tempted to sick carbuncle on you to find you

The shaking had returned to Prompto’s hands, and he placed the phone face down on his mattress, trying to breathe. Noctis was supposed to leave parts of his lunch on the roof for him to find and take, but all of that had gone sideways with the stupid situation he’d put himself in. He was honestly lucky that Noctis  _ hadn’t _ seen him, because Astrals knew what either of them would’ve done.

After collecting himself enough to function, Prompto picked up his phone and started typing out a message, forcing himself to remain calm. A part of him—a large part of him, if he wanted to be completely honest with himself—wanted to type out a frantic message in all caps. But the slightly rational part of himself, forced into the forefront of his mind by his panic, reminded him that Noctis wasn’t talking to  _ him. _ If he didn’t act like Andy, then Noctis might actually go through with the threat of siccing  ‘carbuncle’ on him, whatever that meant.

**xXchocobabe83:** no im fine i couldnt make it 2 the school 2day

**xXchocobabe83:** do u no what happened?? what kind of acid was it?

**iamthenight:** oh thank the astrals you’re alive

**iamthenight:** no damn idea, but when i was walking back to history, a group of guys in yellow hazmat suits rushed past me to the roof

**xXchocobabe83:** damn glad i wasnt there!

**xXchocobabe83:** what about u? r u ok?

**iamthenight:** i’m fine, iggy’s just breathing down my neck and it’s pissing me off

**iamthenight:** he keeps trying to see what i’m “fretting over”

**iamthenight:** there isn’t a doubt in my mind that he and my dad already know about the weird goop stuff

**iamthenight:** i’ve got about 50 gil riding on the fact that there’ll be an investigation about it within the next week

**iamthenight:** or they’ll shut down the school to investigate it.

**iamthenight:** 3 day weekend because of potential chemical terrorist activity, all right!

**xXchocobabe83:** dont joke abt that!!

**iamthenight:** why? wouldn’t you like to wander the halls without having to worry about potential trampling?

**xXchocobabe83:** theres a beach trip thats happening within the next week or so but if 2 many days r lost then they wont do it :(

**iamthenight:** you’d prefer going to school than not for a beach trip?

**xXchocobabe83:** i dont get 2 go a lot of places outside of the walls a lot bro

**xXchocobabe83:** a beach trip is essentially an all expense paid vacation

**iamthenight:** titan’s asscrack that’s depressing

**xXchocobabe83:** the lyfe of a minimum-wage frogman is difficult ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

**iamthenight:** i’m not even gonna BOTHER arguing against that

From there, the conversation flowed easily, eventually completely deviating from the rooftop incident into more mundane things (mostly Noctis complaining about his day). Prompto could almost imagine that nothing had happened, that he really was this mysterious third person that didn’t have anything to do with what happened.

But then the conversation stopped—Noctis had to attend a late council meeting, something about learning political talk—and reality came crashing back down on him. He breathed deeply, simply collecting himself before putting his Chocobo plushie to the side and looking at the watch on his wrist. With a slightly shaky grip, he tapped the face’s edge and flinched when the cylinder popped up, the design shifting to display the silhouettes. The sudden action made him flinch, and he was sorely tempted to grab his Chocobo plushie again.

“You’re fine, Prompto, you’re fine.” Prompto told himself, looking at the picture of the dog creature. “Okay then… what am I gonna call you?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> \- Sorry for the slight angst, but I felt like this story needed a bit more depth than the general campy, feel-good nature that came with the TV series. Not to mention, Prompto’s nature and the environment he lives in wouldn’t really allow something as light hearted to occur. This boy is literally branded as someone from Niflheim, the enemy of the nation he’s lived in all his life, and he’s had a lot of mental issues as well. He isn’t an innocent ten-year-old, he’s a teenager with very real, very big insecurities and mental issues.
> 
> \- Muscas more or less looks the same as his Ben 10 counterpart, except his eyes have no pupils (which were added into Omniverse, for some reason). No one talks about the reboot’s design for Stinkfly. _No one._
> 
> \- This will be the last we ever really see of the bullies as a main opposing force. They more or less leave Prompto alone after this, though they do side eye him in shock sometimes because _what the fuck_ aren’t you supposed to be _dead?_
> 
> \- I was going to make it that Prompto and Noctis met on the roof… while Prompto was still transformed. Noctis wouldn’t have reacted well, and that would’ve really messed with Prompto’s mental state. I decided to forgo it because 1) I’m hurting Prompto enough as is and 2) _I really suck at writing fighting scenes guys,_ and that would’ve been a long, confusing fight scene.


	5. What It Did

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompto tests out a new alien during the school trip to the beach, and finally enjoys his time out on the water. Meanwhile, Noctis is locked away in the Citadel, and is informed about a decision his father makes concerning his education.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I would just like to preface this chapter with this: I DIDN'T KNOW MONSTER OF THE DEEP WAS COMING OUT ON THE 21ST, AND THE ALIEN SELECTED WAS PURELY COINCIDENTAL. If I had known, I would have waited to write this chapter until Monster of the Deep was released, because I would've put a fight scene in which Prompto fights the daemon fish main boss. But, even then, I don't have a VR headset, so I can't play it, and all the footage for the game is... really shit quality and incredibly jerky.
> 
> In the end, this chapter focuses more on Noctis, and less on Prompto. I'm not sorry at all, because Noctis needed development to hint at what he's going to do and I needed to focus on the main series' plot.

Noctis wanted to do nothing more than take the book he was currently reading and drop it on his head.

Actually, scratch that: he wanted to take the Citadel’s entire library, blow it up, and let the rubble slowly crush him to death. Whichever caused him the most physical pain.

“This should _not_ be this hard.” He mumbled into his arms, glaring at the small stack of ancient bestiaries that he’d managed to find. They had detailed passages spanning several pages on the various fauna and daemons that inhabited Lucis and, to a lesser extent, Eos. Granted, they didn’t contain everything about the wildlife in enemy countries, but what little they  _ did _ have certainly hadn’t helped. Sure, all of the books had a decent layer of dust on them, and they certainly weren't as up to date as he'd like, but  none had any description of a creature even similar to Andy.

He wanted to tear his hair out. At least with Carbuncle, he was able to find  _ something, _ even if it wasn’t a picture. It was a brief excerpt from one of the past Kings, describing the same ethereal creature that Noctis saw in his dreams on a frequent basis. As small as it was, finding that information was a massive relief. Nothing he looked at provided any insight to what Andy was and, considering the information Andy had let slip, he might be some sort of test tube creature for all he knew.

Blowing a raspberry, Noctis pushed away from the table and leaned back on his chair, letting it tilt back until his knees stopped him from falling completely. He closed his eyes, trying to stave off the headache that was threatening to overtake him. He was tempted to grab his phone and try and reach Andy through King’s Knight, only to remember the very reason he wasn’t at school today.

The beach trip hadn’t been cancelled, to Andy’s mixed delight and Noctis’ utter dismay. As predicted, his father had barred him from going for all the obvious reasons: security would have to be there constantly, you wouldn’t be able to swim out too far without someone accompanying you, blah blah blah.

Whatever. He didn’t want to show his back off to anyone, anyways. He reached up to pinch the bridge of his nose, and let his eyes open a crack, if only to contemplate the fancy-schmancy art on the ceiling. 

He instead met the amber gaze of one Gladiolus Amicitia.

Later, Noctis would deny that he had flailed (because he most certainly had  _ not _ flailed), just that his knee jerked and had thrown his balance off. Still, he had Gladio to thank for grabbing him and putting the chair back on its four legs, though not without a little grumbling. “Didn’t realize beefy dumbasses could be stealthy.”

“Didn’t know that you knew where the library _was,_ your Highness.” Gladio grabbed the back of Noctis' chair and pushed him in until his stomach was brushing against the table. “You do realize that you could snap your neck by doing that, right?”

“That’s a story used to scare six-year-olds.”

“Considering your attitude, I wouldn’t be surprised if you were that age.” Noctis turned his head, somewhat exasperated to see Ignis approaching the table with a tray full of food. “Wipe that grin off your face, it’s not all for you.”

“Good, more veggies for you guys then.” Noctis huffed, barely managing to dodge the playful swipe of Gladio’s hand. “Knock it off, I’m not in the mood.”

“Like that’s not obvious.” Gladio picked up one of the bestiaries and flipped to a random page, his eyebrow arching. “Well, looky here, He's doing work  _ without _ being bribed.”

Ignis placed the tray on an empty section of the small table Noctis had grabbed and placed his hand on the Prince’s forehead. “...You don’t  feel feverish.”

“Lay  _ off, _ Ignis.” Noctis roughly shoved the hand away, grabbing a fork and knife, and a plate from the tray that had a sizable portion of meat with a few, pitiful stalks of broccoli on the side. As if to irritate his advisor more, he stabbed each stalk and then roughly slid all of them off his fork onto the tray.

“Shiva’s tits, who shit in your cereal?” Gladio grumbled, grabbing the second plate and most of Noctis’ discarded broccoli.

“Today’s just… not a good day.”

“Are you that upset about not being able to go on the beach trip?” Ignis inquired from his left. He had yet to take his own serving of food, instead placing his elbows on the table and peering at Noctis over his interlaced his fingers.

“No, it’s just…” He sighed, pushing around some of the meat on his plate. “There’s a lot more going on than that.”

“What, like the announcement your father ma—ow!” Gladio’s knee hit the table, and he glared at Ignis while he massaged it.

Noctis perked up, letting his fork dangle from his fingers. “What announcement?”

“Nothing.” Ignis interjected. “Nothing you need to worry about, your highness—”

“Ignis,” He leaned over the table, eyes narrowed.  _ “What announcement.” _

A tense minute passed, but Gladio sighed and gave in, despite the murderous glare Ignis sent his way. “His majesty’s considering pulling you out of public school for a while.”

“...And how long is ‘a while’?”

“Dunno. Maybe a month?” Gladio’s shrug and pained expression said more than what he probably wanted to say. A month out of school was a very generous estimate, and probably nowhere near correct.

Shoving away from the table, Noctis made his way to the library’s doors with hunched shoulders. He threw the door open and slammed it shut behind him, the bang making Gladio and Ignis jump.  With a sigh, Ignis took the barely eaten plate of lunch and placed it back on the tray. “This is precisely why I advised you not to mention anything.”

“Kid has a right to know. It’s his education, his  life.”

“And, ultimately, it is not his decision as to where he’s schooled. If his majesty decrees what’s best for his son, then we must follow through.”

Gladio crossed his arms and glared at the various books covering the desk. “Still doesn’t mean it’s right. I mean, you saw how lifeless he was before he went to public school. Granted, it wasn’t much, but he’s been more happy in the past two weeks then the past few years I’ve been training him.”

“Don’t think I haven’t noticed the effects, Gladiolus. But whether it comes to his happiness or his safety, you know the council, the public,  _ and _ his majesty will pick his safety first.”

Gladio didn’t say anything, glaring at the book that he’d grabbed earlier. “He’s never studied this hard, either. I remember you complaining about that a lot.”

Ignis huffed. “I ultimately don’t have much say in this argument, Gladiolus. We both know this.”

“But you might be able to sway his majesty’s decision, even if it’s only a little bit.” Gladio sighed, taking a few more bites of his lunch before standing, pushing his chair back in before patting Ignis’ shoulder. “Just… try. Please? I don’t even want to know what an angry, depressed Noctis is like during training.”

“I make no promises.” Ignis called over his shoulder as Gladio left, much less dramatically than the Prince had. Left alone to his own devices, Ignis began to place the plates on his tray, knowing that he didn’t have any activities to do in the library—not today, at least.

He paused, however, upon glancing at the spine of one of the books left at the table.  _ The Monsters of Eos. _ One of the pages had even been dog-eared.

_ Strange. _ Ignis thought as he left the library with the book pinned firmly under his arm. At the very least he could attempt to ease the burden of studying in his odd attempt at a peace offering.

* * *

It was stupidly, unbearably warm in the bus. Even with every window open, it felt like Prompto was breathing in molasses, and it didn’t help that he was wearing jeans and a long sleeved t-shirt.

Dammit, it was  _ October.  _ Insomnia should’ve been breezy and just cold enough for a sweatshirt, not so hot that it the best way to get cool would be best to rip his skin off.

Still, Prompto noted as he leaned back in his bus seat and looked at his notebook, school had certainly gotten better. The jocks more or less left him alone, the only form of interaction between them was a very confused, incredibly panicked look of shock before the quickly turned away. It was one of the few positives that came out of The Rooftop Incident, as Prompto dubbed it, and he was eternally grateful. The less people that messed with others, the better.

Along with that, he’d occasionally get to steal some of the food Noct had left him. Sometimes he just barely missed the Prince, and could sneak up to the roof to nibble on the veggies that had been left in a plastic bag just behind one of the doors. Most of the time, however, Prompto tended to be early, and he’d quickly change into Andy to have a light and easy conversation with Noctis before leaving.

It… was nice, admittedly. He certainly didn’t hate interacting with the Prince, given by how frequently they communicated over King’s Knight whenever they had free time, but it was nerve wracking. It wasn’t just that he was masquerading as some fantasy creature or whatever, but there was also the deep rooted notion that he was a normal, everyday citizen, casually joking with the Prince. Honestly, if Prompto travelled back in time to when he was still chubby, and told himself everything that had happened in the past two weeks, he wouldn’t be surprised if he would be shipped off to a looney bin.

Didn’t mean that Prompto didn’t have a lot of problems to deal with. Making friends and stopping his ‘enemies’ didn’t magically alleviate every stress and worry in his life. He was still concerned about the watch, about being found out, and a plethora of other things on top of all of that.

But for now, he had a list, a few basic sketches of the creatures he’d looked at on his watch, and a couple of potential names next to each and every one of them.

After The Rooftop Incident, Prompto had taken a quick look at all the creatures he had on his watch. He hadn’t changed, not immediately. Instead he looked at their silhouettes and made a few shittily-drawn scribbles in his notebook and left enough room on the sides to think about what he could call them. He was getting tired of calling himself ‘bug-thing’ and ‘dog-creature’ in his mind, and it gave him a decent method of dealing with the weirdness of everything happening.

So far, he’d settled on two. ‘Andy’ had been changed slightly to ‘Ant-man’—not that he didn’t like the name Andy, but it felt incredibly weird to call a creature that was anything  _ but _ normal a normal name. The other one was Muscas, for the fly creature. It fit surprisingly well, considering that in the ye-olde-language of Lucis, musca was the word for ‘Fly’, and it sounded like ‘mucus’.

The first one—the dog—was harder to figure out. He didn’t want to call himself ‘Canis’, because in the end, this thing wasn’t really a  _ dog, _ it just acted like one. And he didn’t want to call himself ‘blind’ because, really, the word sounded a lot like ‘cock’.

So instead, he was brainstorming classic dog names to call himself, and somehow that was even more difficult because he couldn’t settle on one. All the other creatures (ten in total) had vague, general names that were more guesses on what they could possibly look like and do than anything solid that he was going to pick.

The jolt of the bus stopping snapped Prompto out of his musings, and he looked around to see the rest of the passengers scrambling for their beach bags and towels to get the best spots. With markedly less enthusiasm, Prompto began to pack whatever he didn’t immediately need into his messenger bag and was the last to leave.

He sighed when the blistering heat of the beach smacked him, watching as the other students fidget on the sidewalk mere steps away from paradise. One of the chaperones managed to stand on top of a fence, and she cupped her hands over her mouth. “Alright, listen up! You need to get back here at 1 o’clock sharp, no buts, or you’re being left behind! There’s plenty of places nearby to get lunch, so it’s up to you to pay for it, understood?”

A few, unenthusiastic “yes ma’am”s came from the group, but that was enough. With a sharp nod, she gestured to the beach, and carefully stepped down from the fence as the teens rushed to the water, playfully pushing others out of the way.

Prompto lagged behind, however, looking for the spot where there would be the least amount of people. True, he liked the beach, and he certainly preferred going to the beach rather than spending another boring day in school. It wasn’t the overly hot weather that bothered him either, because he expected that the beach be warm, but…

He wrapped one of his arms protectively around his stomach, his fingers pinching at the thin fabric of his shirt.

He really,  _ really _ didn’t want to go swimming.

Thankfully, going swimming was not a required activity. Really, the chaperones only cared that you make it back to them by the time they had to leave, because it was essentially a day of relaxation for them. In the past, Prompto had spent his time taking photos of fellow classmates and submitting them to the yearbook, or taking scenic shots of the coastline to sell to magazines. While he did feel the familiar itching in his fingers to pull out his camera and memorialize whatever he could, he stubbornly suppressed it and made an abrupt turn to the right, towards a rocky area of the beach.

He walked until the sounds of his classmates was a low din in the background, and he was decently hidden behind a small row of rocks. Confident that he could be seen, Prompto took his messenger bag and put it in a slightly hidden spot between two rocks. He glanced over the rocks once more to see if anyone had seen him, and then sat down on the sand, touching the face of the watch.

Yes, it probably would be safer if he tried transforming into the creatures when he was home, but there was only so much he could do while trapped in his room. Plus, he really wanted to try out a specific creature that looked like it would be  _ perfect _ for a day at the beach. Pinching the watch’s face, Prompto didn’t jump when the cylinder popped up, but he did look around cautiously as the high-pitched beeps rang out. The last thing he needed was some kid, too curious for his own good, to come careening out from behind a rock, screaming, “Bomb, bomb! The blonde kid has a bomb!”

He scoffed and shook his head at his own thought. Sure, it wasn’t out of the realm of possibilities, and any kid who’d watched a cop drama would probably assume that the beeps were, in fact, a bomb timer. But the odds of that happening to him, in such a secluded place, when most of the kids were already in the water and oblivious to anything but their sand castles and body slamming into the oncoming waves, were close to zero.

And with that thought, he pushed down on the watch face, closing his eyes to avoid being blinded as he felt the accustomed feeling of nausea settle as his body changed. Prompto refused to move in the seconds following the change, waiting with bated breath to hear an exclamation of shock, or someone running away with a scream. When nothing happened and the ambient noise of the beach remained uninterrupted, he carefully opened his eyes and looked down at his hands.

Pale, silver-blue scales coated his skin, contrasting against his beige claws and the somewhat transparent rubbery webbing between his fingers. He wiggled his toes as best as he could, only feeling two respond. Carefully, Prompto lifted his hand to his jaw, feeling his changed bones and muscles move as he opened his closed his mouth experimentally. He looked down and was surprised to see that, what he thought would be a toga or some other form of cloth based on the silhouette, was actually a layer of scales. They were slick and oil-black in color, and remained stubbornly rigid and refused to flex, only vaguely shift left and right with his steps.

“Huh…” Prompto’s hand flew to his throat as he heard the distorted, almost-growl sound that left him. Then the tips of his fingers ran across three lines dragging horizontally across his neck, which widened and pushed out in response to his probing.

_ Gills, _ his mind supplied automatically, feeling the odd pressure and knowing that placing any more on them would probably not be the best thing for his health. Prompto removed his hands, but almost immediately put them back as he realized what having gills meant.

With a surprising amount of speed for a creature of his bulk and size, Prompto ran into the ocean, diving under the water once the he was waist deep. Something slid over his eyes, and his vision became blurrier, though not completely unclear. Once the sand settled, his gills opened once again, and Prompto felt the seawater brush against his neck, though no water entered, only air.

The sensation of breathing underwater with no special apparatus was enough to put Prompto on edge, as his mind was telling him he should be drowning while his body adjusted easily to the new method of breathing. It was weird, so,  _ so  _ weird, and Prompto eventually couldn’t take it and managed to get his feet under him so that he could stand with his head above the waves.

It wasn’t a complete fix—hell, it wasn’t even technically a fix since his gills were still under the water, and he was still using them to breath—but it made Prompto feel a bit more comfortable. Keeping one eye on the coast to his left to make sure no one had spotted him, Prompto kicked out with his feet and moved into slightly deeper waters. He glided through the water, his lower half moving in a completely alien matter that, while weird for any human to try and do, was apparently natural for him.

When his feet couldn’t touch the bottom, Prompto closed his eyes and allowed his body to sink. He didn’t get far, only a couple feet before his back hit the sandy floor of the ocean. He felt the waves ripple over him, gently coasting across his skin as his breathed. He’d done this before in his house’s tub, when he was much smaller and he could actually submerge himself. Granted, he didn’t breathe in the water, but the effect was calming, nonetheless.

Prompto pushed his webbed hands above head and felt some of the vertebrates in his back pop. He noticed, quite belatedly, that his legs had pressed together under the layer of black scales to form one, long tail that flicked up and down with his stretch. His mind was slowly but surely acclimating to the creature’s many conflicting differences with his normal human body, and he was growing at ease with himself. 

It was one of the reasons why he wanted to do this on the day of the school trip, despite the dangers: he knew from the silhouette alone that his shoddy house would probably not be the best place to try this guy out.

With a faint grin (that probably looked downright  _ terrifying _ to anyone else given his massive, sharp teeth), Prompto flipped himself over and sped away from the shore, doing a few fancy underwater tricks and flips as he went. He wouldn’t stray too far from the shore—certainly not enough to get lost or stranded if the watch suddenly timed out, and he never strayed so far as to not be able to see at least a few human legs—but he’d have his fun while he could.

* * *

“This isn’t right.”

“I’m well aware.”

“I’m not going to make this easy, you know.”

“I know very well.”

“Then why bother?” Noctis spun to look at his father with a barely-restrained fire burning in his eyes. His father barely flinched, and Noctis couldn’t tell if that was because he was expecting his rage-fueled outburst and the almost aloof debate or, after all his years of ruling, a childish temper tantrum was hardly something to blink at. “Why bother even pulling me out of school, if you know I’m just going to—”

“Noctis.” He froze halfway through pacing across his father’s room once again. Regis very rarely used his first name, always referring to him as ‘son’ first, and he could feel the hairs on his arm rise. “I know that this is not a decision to take lightly, but in light of recent developments—”

“Which are  _ what?  _ That’s what I don’t understand, I’ve been going to school for three years now, and I’m starting my fourth. My grades have been fine, Gladio’s training has been going fine, I’m learning how to act at Council meetings and take notes because of Ignis. Is it because I have to start training how to warp, and access the armiger? Is  _ that _ why?”

Regis sighed and worried his bottom lip, and Noctis rocked back on his heels. “Why are you pulling me out of school” was not a difficult question to answer, but his father was making it anything but, and it was starting to aggravate Noctis more than the news itself. He couldn’t get a straightforward answer out of him, and the only options Noctis had at this point would be to roll over and admit defeat, or push until he got the  _ real  _ answer.

So far, Noctis was winning.

His father sighed and pushed himself up and out of his chair, resting his elbows on his desk and crossing his fingers in front of his face. He looked far,  _ far _ too old for… forty-five? Honestly, even Noctis wasn’t certain how old his father was, at this point. His leg was getting weaker by the day, and his hair was almost completely gray, not a single speck of black to be found. Regardless, in that moment, he looked ancient, and for a split second, Noctis felt bad for pressuring an answer out of him.

Then he spoke. “What I’m about to tell you can not be divulged to  _ anyone _ in the castle, is that understood? Not Ignis, not Gladio, not any maid or servant or what-have-you. This remains between us.”

Noctis stopped his pacing and met his father’s serious gaze, nodding slowly. “Yeah, course.”

Regis sighed again, but he knew that was the best answer he was going to get. “A week ago, guards patrolling the outer walls of Insomnia noticed that a pack of Voretooths had snuck in. They dispatched of them quickly, and assumed it was a stray pack, and that they had found a hidden tunnel underground and had miraculously survived any daemons they would have come across.

“However, similar instances continued to occur. One odd encounter with a pack of Voretooth turned into multiple instances spanning across the wall. When night fell, small daemons managed to sneak in, and a fair portion of the night patrol was killed in the beginning fray.” Regis sagged and examined his left hand, twisting the midnight black ring on his finger. “As far as we are aware, the crystal is in working order, and the walls should be working at full strength. The only conclusion we can make is--”

“This is some elaborate attack by Niflheim.” Noctis finished, his expression impassive as he took in what his father was implying. “You think they’ve weakened the walls.”

“And that there could be an incoming attack.” Regis finished. “The discover was recent, but who knows how long the walls have been in this state. If there is an attack, we can’t risk members of the royal family and the Citadel going into insecure areas without proper defenses. This, unfortunately, extends to you and your education.”

Noctis scoffed and looked to the side, his nails pinching into the fabric of his jeans. He let the tense silence around them continue for a few minutes before abruptly rising. “Yeah, I get it.”

“Noctis--”

“No, really, I get it.” Noctis turned around and made his way to the office door. “Thanks for letting me know.”

He closed the door behind him with a bit more force than necessary, taking slight satisfaction in the resulting slam. He practically stomped his way up to his old room in the Citadel, knowing that he’d be prevented from going to his apartment by… someone. Either security, the Kingsglaive, or Ignis himself. He might as well take the walk of shame voluntarily.

Fine. He couldn’t leave the Citadel? He couldn’t go to school? That was all  _ fine. _ Noctis could deal with that.

~~ (No he couldn’t.) ~~

His room in the Citadel had been cleaned since he’d left that morning to go to the library. He had planned to live in a personal apartment, but his request hadn’t gone through yet, mostly because he hadn’t found an apartment that his father and the rest of the council would approve of. However, considering everything that was happening outside of his control, he really doubted that it was going to be approved any time soon, if at all. 

With a groan, Noctis walked to the couch only to flop against the cushions with a low groan. He suppressed the urge to take one of the small throw pillows and smother his face with it, and he left the TV remote alone. Not one of his video games seemed alluring, and he was pretty sure that if he wasn’t going to school anymore, he didn’t have to do the homework he was assigned.

He pulled his phone out of his jean pocket, seeing no new notifications on any of his social media accounts or in his text messages. Out of reflex, he tapped the King’s Knight app, grimacing at the bright-colored loading screen. He’d collect the dailies, maybe, then turn off his phone and have a good, long nap.

Noctis’ fingers froze as he realized that he had automatically opened the message board, his old conversations with Andy loading in. He placed his phone facedown on his chest, thinking back. His dad had said that the first ‘incident’ was a week ago, right?

...Didn’t he meet Andy a week ago?

With his lips pressed together, Noctis typed a message and clicked send before he could second guess what he wanted to do.

**iamthenight:** are you the reason why the walls are weak?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> \- I’m sorry if Ignis, Gladio and Regis (ESPECIALLY Regis) aren't exactly in character. I don't write them nearly as much as Noctis and  
> Prompto, so I haven't got them down quite yet!
> 
> \- The reason why Prompto immediately doesn’t begin to suffocate on land is because Ripjaws has been shown to not need to breathe water for a decent amount of time after transforming, even without coming into contact with water. It’s also stated on the wiki that the older he gets, the longer he can stay on land without needing to breathe through the water. Personally speaking, I like to imagine that a 15 year old Ripjaws could stay on land for about 20 minutes without contact with water.
> 
> \- On that note, I guess I never really mentioned Prompto and Noctis’ ages, huh? At the time of the prologue chapter, Noctis is 15, and Prompto is a few weeks shy of his 15th birthday. Chapter 7 will take place on Prompto’s birthday! 
> 
> \- Piscis’ gills were ‘flaring’ when Prompto was examining himself. It’s something that Betta Fish do to establish dominance and to show they’re alert or angry. In that scene, I made it more of a reflex response.
> 
> \- Originally this chapter was going to have, duh-duhduh-DAH, another fight scene! I scrapped it halfway through writing the chapter, though, because it would have been a really weird and one-sided fight that I couldn’t imagine ending positively for anyone involved ^^; *(I don’t want to torture Prompto or anyone else, I swear). Plus, I wanted to get Noctis a bit more involved so that the next few chapters could flow more easily. This fic was supposed to originally be a collection of loosely-related one-shot-esque chapters that detailed Prompto getting used to all the aliens, but I decided to make the plot more connected and introduce more characters for the rest of the series.


	6. Stuck Itself

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompto stresses out over being a potentially-convicted felon, Noctis angsts over his new ‘Prince locked in a tower’ status, Ignis feels bad, Gladio not so much, and they all make mistakes both minor and major.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I AM SO SORRY FOR LEAVING YOU ALL ON THAT CLIFFHANGER BUT THIS CHAPTER HAS EBEN KICKING MY ASS FOR NEARLY A MONTH AND A HALF NOW AND IT'S FINALLY D O N E.
> 
> This chapter is dedicated to yoitssabrinee on Tumblr! Happy birthday, and may your day at the very least be decent, if not amazing!

“Now, you see, probability is represented by the letter ‘P’. When you are trying to find the probability of something, we’ll assign a capital letter to it. So, the probability that all of you will hand in your homework on time, with ‘H’ representing that scenario, would be written as P of H, with parentheses around the H.”

Prompto flicked his pencil, watching it roll up his desk before rolling back into his waiting hand. The lesson on probability was boring, and not just because the teacher had the most monotone voice known to mankind. He’d already learned most of this last year, and today was a day to ‘refresh’ the students on what probability was.

His mind wandered, and he pulled out his phone, automatically opening the King’s Knight app. A new round of dailies would most definitely _not_ be ready, but he wasn’t looking to play. He opened up the messageboard, tapping on Noctis’ icon to see if anything new had come in, despite the lack of a ‘new message’ notification.

**iamthenight:** are you the reason why the walls are weak?

He’d seen it when he got back to his house from the beach trip, unwilling and unable to let his data bill rise any higher than he could risk it. Once connected to his house’s internet, he’d opened the app with abundant excitement, ready to talk about the series of cool shots he’d gotten of the coastline. Not only that, but Piscis wasn’t the only alien he’d tried out. He tried out a couple more once the watch ‘recharged’, and he’d solidified a few names that were on his list. While he couldn’t talk about it with the Prince, he was riding an emotional high, something he hadn’t really felt since…

Well, since he first talked to Noctis, actually.

But the moment he saw that message, he felt his stomach tie itself into knots, and he turned off his phone and plugged it in to charge. He ignored it for the rest of the evening, too, refusing to touch it until tomorrow morning in a sleepy haze, half-expecting to see long conversations carrying well into the night.

But instead, he got a good look at the last message Noctis sent and quickly shut his phone off once again, his gaze locking onto his watch-bound wrist. He hadn’t even known that the walls _were_ weak, and that felt like incredibly confidential information to boot. What felt even worse was the accusatory tone behind the words.

Sure, it might just be a simple question, but coming from the Prince of Lucis about the state of the only thing keeping the city safe, it certainly didn’t _feel_ like a simple question.

The worst part of this whole thing was that Prompto didn’t even have a proper answer for Noctis’ question. The general inclination was that, no, he definitely wasn’t the thing weakening the walls, and he had no motive for weakening the walls. However, that sounded suspicious to anyone, and saying “yes” or “i don’t know” over a messageboard really didn’t seem like the best option.

So he just… didn’t respond. It might’ve been dumb, but he figured that he could get to talk to Noctis, maybe explain the whole thing as _him_ and come clean. He could deal with an angry, probably sword-wielding Prince while he was crown-citizen Prompto. He’d probably die if he went in as tiny, frog-man Andy or… Antman or… whatever he was going to call himself.

But Noctis never showed up. He waited, looking over his shoulder as the periods droned by. He barely paid attention, so keyed up on paranoia and anxiety that time seemed to drag on but be a blur at the same time. By the time lunch happened and Noctis still hadn’t showed up, Prompto had given up, and he made his way up the stairs to the roof with his shittily-made sandwich.

He nibbled at his food as he waited for the King’s Knight app to load, tapping impatiently at the corner of the screen for the messageboard. When he finally, _finally_ loaded, he frantically typed away, having to erase multiple words as his fingers shook.

**xXchocobabe83:** hey where r u?

Prompto paced back and forth, taking the occasional small bite of his lunch as he moved. He ate more out of knowledge that if he didn’t, he would have wasted the food and would be starving for the rest of the day. When his phone pinged with a new message, he nearly choked on his sandwich, and he prayed to the Astrals that Noctis would be willing to put aside his question last night to have a somewhat normal-esque conversation.

**iamthenight:** i dunno, where’s my answer?

Welp, he was fucked _._

**xXchocobabe83:** look i didnt want to just message u my answer so i thought we could meet up 2day 2 talk abt it

**xXchocobabe83:** but then u didnt show up and now im trying 2 not sound like an inconsiderate jackass rn and apologizing

**iamthenight:** and you couldn’t have told me this last night because…?

**xXchocobabe83:** bc i dont kno what the hell ur talking abt???

**xXchocobabe83:** i didnt even kno the walls were weke b4 u asked me

**xXchocobabe83:** so now im freaking out for 2 reasons

**xXchocobabe83:** ur not here and apparently were defenseless against the bad guys

**iamthenight:** we’re not COMPLETELY defenseless

**iamthenight:** we can defend just fine

**xXchocobabe83:** semantics then

**xXchocobabe83:** doesnt change the fact that THE WALLS ARE WEAK?!?!?

**xXchocobabe83:** how tf does that even happen????

**iamthenight:** i’m certainly not telling you

**xXchocobabe83:** wait u kno?

**iamthenight:** if i did i’m not telling you

Prompto made a strangled sound and dropped his sandwich completely, running his free hand through his hair as he resisted the urge to throw his phone. _Fuck. You fucking idiot why the hell did you not just respond last night!_

**xXchocobabe83:** noctis pls im sorry

**iamthenight:** i somehow doubt that

**xXchocobabe83:** PLEASE i just wanted to explain myself irl than over a text

**xXchocobabe83:** im not hiding anything from u i swear

**iamthenight:** and once again, i somehow doubt that

**xXchocobabe83:** please just come to the school ill explain and we can talk and smooth everything over

**iamthenight:** even if i wanted to (which i dont) i cant. dad imposed his kingly duties and i’m locked in the citadel with my advisor carefully monitoring me.

**xXchocobabe83:** u gotta b kidding me

**iamthenight:** do you think i WANT to be here???

**iamthenight:** fuck, school was the one normal thing i had and now it’s gone because of this stupid wall bullshit

**iamthenight:** i wanted to get an apartment so that i wouldn’t have to stay in the citadel but guess what! that’s shot to shit too.

**xXchocobabe83:** noct calm down

**xXchocobabe83:** NONE of this is ur fault

**xXchocobabe83:** and it isnt mine either

**xXchocobabe83:** but we srsly need 2 talk face 2 face

**xXchocobabe83:** i cant do this over a fucking messageboard im stressing tf out

**iamthenight:** YOUR STRESSING OUT?!

**iamthenight:** wow. I had no idea. and here i am assuming that i was the only one capable of feeling stress. my gods.

**xXchocobabe83:** u become really aggressive when ur mad did u no that???

**iamthenight:** ANDY

**iamthenight:** TALK

**iamthenight:** NOW

**xXchocobabe83:** okokok just…

**xXchocobabe83:** weird question

**xXchocobabe83:** ur gonna think im weird just prepping u

**xXchocobabe83:** but what floor of the citadel r u on

**xXchocobabe83:** and when u look out the window in ur room what do u see

**xXchocobabe83:** actually do u even have a window???

**iamthenight:** yes, i have a window.

**iamthenight:** i’m on the 15th floor, and the school would be to my left.

**iamthenight:** you know Cogita Mall? i’m on the side of the citadel parallel to that. it’s directly in front of me.

**xXchocobabe83:** ok give me like 5 10 mins

Prompto slipped his phone into his pocket, discarding his lunch. Hopefully, if this worked, he’d be able to have lunch at the Citadel with Noctis.

The thought alone made his hands shake, and he took a deep breath to calm himself. Security would probably be amped the hell up, but so long as there weren’t any motion detectors on the windows, he should be fine. He could sneak in and talk to Noctis just _fine_.

Only, he’d have to do it as Muscas. Who, at this very moment, was best known for freaking out a majority of the sports kids and spitting up acid.

Honestly, Prompto’d dealt with worse over the past few weeks.

The watch activated with the familiar fanfare, and with a few twists, Muscas’ silhouette appeared. Bracing for the odd sensation of changing, Prompto slammed his hand down on the dial, and let the green light engulf him.

* * *

Noctis was not having a good day.

On the surface, he looked no different than yesterday. None of his tutors made any comments about snide comments or disinterested attitude, but only because he didn’t let it show. He went along and studied for his subjects, taking a few idle notes about the course as they prattled on, and went back to his room for lunch.

Ignis had made his favorite, a Mother and Child Rice Bowl, and moved to leave. He hesitated at the door, looking over his shoulder. His mouth opened and closed before his eyes hardened and he looked at the floor, leaving Noctis’ room with a little pout.

Noctis counted to ten before picking up his bowl and putting in his refrigerator. He wasn’t hungry, not even when he woke up, and he wasn’t in the mood for eating. Bored, he pulled out his phone, opening the King’s Knight app automatically. He wasn’t expecting much, if he was being honest. If Andy didn’t respond when he got the message last night, he highly doubted that he would respond since then.

Except, hovering over the messageboard icon was the little bubble indicating that he’d gotten a new message. Clicking on it, he saw Andy’s familiar username, and let out a sigh of relief. Thank the Gods, and answer, finally!

**xXchocobabe83:** hey where r u?

Noctis starred dumbly at the screen. He scrolled up a bit, half expecting to see that he hadn’t actually sent his previous message.

Nope, it had gone through.

For the rest of the conversation, Noctis let his anger bleed through his messages. He knew it was unfair, because really, he was mad at everyone _but_ Andy. He was mad at the council for saying that security needed to be tightened, he was mad with his father for agreeing and barely even listening to what he had to say for “the greater good”, he was mad at Gladio and Ignis for not trying to argue his case to whoever would listen.

Most importantly, he was mad that he couldn’t do anything about it: the Council’s word overrode his until he was crowned as King, and at most, he was an observer in their eyes. His opinion might was as influential as a dog that had its vocal cords cut.

So he took it out on Andy a little bit, let his aggression take hold. His mind only started to clear when he told Andy what floor he lived on. He figured that, maybe, the little frogman was going to send him a smoke signal. Or maybe just hack into the landlines to talk to him through a telephone. Really, Noctis just trusted Andy. Despite the lack of response last night, it didn’t mean that Noctis’ trust had been exploited. Plus, he was trying to make amends, and figure out a way to talk one-on-one despite his lockdown.

When those five minutes passed, Noctis tapped his foot against the floor and checked the app again. His nerves were getting to him, and he refreshed the messageboard again and again, hoping for a hint of whatever Andy was doing. Eventually, he typed out a new message.

**iamthenight:** hey, your 5-10 minutes are up. what’s happening?

**iamthenight:** …

**iamthenight:** Andy, dude, you there?

**iamthenight:** i mean, it makes sense you’re NOT but…

**iamthenight:** don’t leave me hanging again man, okay?

He put his phone down on the counter, drummed his fingers, then picked it up again to check the time. He had maybe twenty minutes before he would start sword practice with Gladio, and ten before Ignis came to check up on him and bring him down to the training halls. At this rate, he wouldn’t have much time to talk to Andy.

Maybe he responded while he wasn’t looking? Noctis picked up his phone—

“Noctis.”

—And immediately dropped it as he heard a thin, raspy voice behind him. He leapt to his feet, pushing back the chair he’d been sitting in and spun around, drawing his sword and falling into a well-practiced battle stance.

Whatever was… _floating_ in his living room wasn’t even vaguely human. It was completely gray with two spindly arms, with a rounded head and no legs, just a wispy tail. Around its neck and wrists was a set of chains, each one connected to a heavy cuff. Criss-crossing over the its body were deepy black lines that pulsed and wiggled, like they settle properly in one position. In the line running over the thing’s head was a single, violet eye.

It lifted its hand and moved it left and right. “Heyo.”

Noctis threw his sword towards the thing with a yell, grasping onto the thin wisps of magic that the Crystal provided him. His body shifted with a faint haze of blue as he warped to his sword, his hand firmly grasping the hilt. The thing let out a raspy yell and floated back, just out of reach as Noctis swung. “Wait—!”

“What the fuck _are_ you?” Noctis yelled as he charged again, stabbing his sword forward in an awkward thrust. The question, though fueled by panic, was real. There were no monsters or daemons that can _speak,_ not with normal voices and human inflections and mannerisms like this thing. Not only that, but the fact that it was just… casually floating in his room was cause for alarm. The Citadel was equipped with a lot of security, human and magical alike, to the point where even rats couldn’t get in without potentially setting off an alarm.

The thing didn’t respond, instead making some weird whimper as it lifted its hands and the eye on its head disappeared into the black lines. By sheer luck alone, Noctis’ sword stabbed through the chain links and twisted in such a way that he couldn’t pull it out, not without snapping it in half. Panicked, Noctis grabbed the chain and tried to pull his sword free.

Except, he pulled too hard, or pushed, or _something,_ because the weird monster thing grabbed his wrists and he pulled it forward and—and—

* * *

To be honest, Prompto wanted the fly monster. For obvious reasons. Mainly the flying thing.

Instead, he got Mister Sperm Man.

He’d only seen the silhouette of the guy, and that was the first name he came up for it, and it was a pretty fitting name based on what he could see. He nearly screamed in anger when he saw that he wasn’t Muscas, because he needed to be able to fly to get to the Citadel.

And then he realized that he could float, which probably meant he could fly.

So, that was one problem solved.

The next problem was getting to Noctis’ room (which, wow, that was probably _super_ illegal and probably grounds for execution) and explaining all of this to him without revealing that he was Prompto. Sure, he could tell him his real name, but if Noctis didn’t believe that he had any good intentions, then giving his name was the first thing that would get him arrested. So long as he didn’t go into detail about what the watch looked like, he should be fine.

Should be.

Hopefully.

Maybe.

“Okay, fifteenth floor…” Prompto rasped as he drew closer, counting the levels of windows from the ground up. “And you can see Cortiga Mall, so… his room should be around here.”

He seriously felt like a stalker as he circled the building, peering through the windows. It was the first time he’d seen a reflection of himself, and the singular, purple eye was honestly the creepiest thing. Really, he could probably star in a movie with his _stunning_ good looks.

Prompto shook his head and went back to focusing on finding Noctis. Eventually, he found a room that looked somewhat lived in, and further in the back was a person in all black slouched over a counter. Bingo. Now all Prompto had to do was get his attention and get him to let him in, without getting security called. He raised his hand to knock on the window.

His hand phased straight through the glass. Prompto blinked, startled, and experimentally pulled his hand back and pushed. When the same thing happened, Prompto let out a somewhat impressed chuckle and moved his entire body through the window.

…Well, that was great and all, but now he was hovering in the middle of the prince’s living room as a giant ghost-thing with the prince still by his kitchen counter. He waved his arms, making the chains click and clatter, but Noctis refused to even look up.

Sighing, Prompto decided to take the more direct route, and said with a raspy voice, “Noctis.”

That made the Prince react, jerking upwards and spinning around out of stool. There was a moment of awkward silence as they observed each other before Prompto carefully raised his hand. “Heyo.”

There were many reactions Prompto expected. He expected Noctis to scream and dive for cover while frantically hitting whatever button or switch to call in his security detail. He expected Noctis to stammer and go weak in the knees and have to hold onto the counter for support because of the weird entity in his room. He expected Noctis to stand there silently and maintain their staring contest.

He did not expect Noctis to summon a really large, really sharp-looking sword and _throw it at him._ With a startled yelp, Prompto quickly hovered back, narrowly avoiding getting sliced by the sword only for Noctis to teleport directly to his side and try to slice him in half. “Wait—!”

“What the fuck _are_ you?” Even if Prompto had a good, solid answer to that question, he wasn’t able to get it out because Noctis was still trying to kill him. Out of sheer reflex, Prompto raised his hands in a “Don’t shoot!” motion, and closed his eyes, hoping that the Prince would stop and try to interrogate him further.

The chains restraining his arms were pulled weirdly, and he opened his singular eye to see that Noctis’ sword had gotten stuck in the chain links. The Prince was pulling at it, trying to get it unstuck, but all he was doing was yanking Prompto’s hands around. Irritated, Prompto reached out and held onto Noctis’ wrists tightly, trying to get him to stop, only to be tugged forward and nearly impaled on the sword as he collided with Noctis and—and—

It felt like he was someone’s voice being forced through that twisty cord on a landline phone. Too big, and yet, he was being molded and twisted around because that was the only path he could take—except there wasn’t a path, and his eyes were closed, and he didn’t know what was _happening—_

Just as quickly as it started, it ended, and Prompto was left swaying in the middle of the living room with his eyes closed, desperately trying to center himself. He took the time to breathe for a few seconds and, upon feeling no metal sword lodged in his chest, he carefully opened his eye.

Somehow, he’d wound up facing the other side of the room. That was fine, but he couldn’t see Noctis anywhere, and that sent a shot of panic into his heart, because if he wasn’t _here_ then he was probably halfway down the hall and running to get security to deal with the daemon haunting his room. Hissing through his teeth, Prompto spun—

And promptly fell flat on his ass when he realized he wasn’t floating anymore, and that he had legs he had to use to walk. He’d just twisted his torso around and leaned forward, expecting that weird tugging he’d used to fly to get him out the door to find Noctis, but nope! Legs. Actual human legs.

Which meant that the watch timed out (despite the fact that whatever he’d just experienced felt _nothing_ like the watch timing out), and he was undeniably _screwed_ if Noctis actually did call in security before the watch could recharge.

“Son of a—” Prompto’s hands flew to cover his mouth. Not because of the curse word he nearly uttered, no, but because whatever just left his lips was absolutely _not_ his voice. He coughed, as if that would clear whatever was in his throat, and then stared in shock at his hands.

Hands, covered in old callouses, nicked with thin white lines, and lacking any freckles or watch or wristbands. Frantically, he clawed at his right wrist, as if expecting to see the makeup that had been applied to his wrist without his knowledge disappear and expose the dark brand.

Nothing happened, except for his pale skin turning red with irritation. He looked down at himself, seeing an all-black outfit that he most certainly _never_ owned and would probably not wear unless he was going to a goth convention. He pulled his hair in front of his eyes and saw thick, black locks instead of his thin, pale hair.

“You’ve got to be kidding me.” Prompto said, but he was using the voice of the Prince of Lucis, while in the body of the Prince of Lucis, and oh _gods_ he was dead, he was so freaking dead. “You’ve got to be freaking _kidding me!”_

Prompto ran and searched for a bathroom. When he found it, he flicked on the lights (somewhat on autopilot—apparently muscle memory was helping him out here, as best as it could) and looked at his reflection.

A knot formed in his throat. Noctis stared back at him, a final nail in the coffin, but what really caught his attention was what was different. His eyes, and the veins around them, were _black._ Not just super dark, but completely pitch black. Like someone injected ink into his eyes. The iris’ were still visible, but they were a vibrant purple.

_The same color as the monster’s eye._ Prompto thought, and the breath that left him next was shaky, bordering on panicked.

And as if the Astrals themselves were finding his situation _hilarious,_ Prompto heard a door somewhere in the apartment open and close. “Noctis?”

_“Fuck.”_ He whispered, abruptly shutting the door and wincing at the loud noise it made. He quickly found the lock and flicked it, then turned the tap for the sink. When a series of knocks rapped against the door, he jumped and stared with wide eyes, half-expecting some titan of a bodyguard to break it down and run him through with a sword.

“Noctis, what are you doing?”

“Nothing! Just… doing something. I’ll be out in a couple minutes.” He said maybe too quickly, if the heavy silence was anything to go by.

“I… Noctis, I just want you to know that I am genuinely sorry for what is happening. I understand that public schooling was a way for you to escape the rather suffocating presence of royalty and…” There was sound of something shuffling and a sigh. “And I wish it hadn’t come to you being under lock and key, but for now, we must deal with the cards we’ve been dealt.”

Prompto winced and looked at his reflection, and the deadly eyes that stared back at him. This felt too personal, even for Noctis’ standards. It was definitely not a conversation he should be a voyeur to, and he didn’t know the first thing about handling a heart-to-heart like this.

“Thanks, but I know there’s not much you can do.” He lied easily, hating himself all the while. “In the end, it’s up to his ma—dad, y’know?”

There was a light chuckle. “Yes, I know. Do keep track of time, will you? Hopefully whatever you’re doing won’t make you late.”

“Yeah, yeah.” He said as the person moved away from the door, and he waited until he heard movement in… probably the kitchen, based on the sound of pots and pans moving around, before he relaxed and ran his hand through his hair.

Not his hand, Noctis’ hand. And not his hair, Noctis’ hair.

“Ramuh smite me.” Prompto swore, wanting to slam his head on the counter and only holding back because, it’s bad enough he’s possessing the Prince, giving him a concussion wouldn’t do him any favors. He needed to talk to Noctis, to explain himself, but he couldn’t do that without getting stabbed once he left Noctis’ body (and that alone would be a struggle for him to figure out how to do). If he tried to leave the bathroom to write a letter, then the person outside would see him and his eyes and try to exorcise him or, even worse, kill him. At the same time, he couldn't just wait around for the watch to time out, because that would lead to a whole other slew of problems.

Prompto really didn’t want to know what would happen if the watch timed out while he was still possessing Noctis. They’d probably become some weird, chimera-human or something.

There was a cheerful little ‘ding!’ from his pocket, and Prompto nearly screamed in shock. Reaching for his pocket, he pulled out Noctis’ phone, reading the notification that had popped up on screen.

**Hunkolicious:** You better not have forgotten training, brat. 1:15 sharp. Don’t be late, or you’ll be training with the Marshal all week.

An idea came to Prompto so suddenly, he could almost imagine the lightbulb going off above his head. “I don’t know who you are, Hunkolicious, but you are the best person on the planet right now.”

Prompto flicked his thumb to the left, opening the camera application. He grinned as he selected the ‘record’ option, and he pressed the red circle, breathing to calm himself before he raised the camera, and began to talk.

* * *

Noctis gasped like a dying man, fingernails digging into the skin of his kneecaps as the world slammed back into him. It felt like Gladio had just smacked the back of head with his greatsword, knocked him out,  then pushed him into a pond to get him to wake up. He coughed, once, then twice, and realized he was sitting upright, with his phone in his hand, and he’d somehow gotten into his bathroom because he was sitting on his toilet with the sink running, for some reason.

…Did he blackout or something?

A few sharp knocks came from the door. “Noctis? You’ve been in there for quite a while now.”

“Uh, yeah, specs. Nearly… nearly done!” With… whatever he was doing in the first place.

Okay, first thing first, turn off the sink. The water was cold, and he wasn’t soaking wet or anything, so he hadn’t taken an impromptu bath. Hell, the lid on the toilet was even down, so he hadn’t fallen asleep while taking a shit.

What happened before he passed out? He was in his living room, messaging Andy over King’s Knight, and then—

And then a daemon had waltzed into his room and tried to _talk_ to him.

Noctis was shoving the door open before he fully processed what he was doing, his sword materializing in his hand with the sound of shattering glass, as he ran into his living room. His eyes frantically darted around, trying to catch a glimpse of the daemon and hope against hope that it hadn’t gotten Ignis.

Everything looked normal, including Ignis’ somewhat scandalized stare. “What on Eos are you doing?”

“I—” Noctis panted and dismissed his sword. Of course, Ignis probably wouldn’t know what had happened before he showed up—however long ago that was. The daemon was probably long gone, and he knew that Ignis wouldn’t let anyone or anything harm him, so he had to have been fine. How he got into the bathroom, and why Ignis hadn’t come into the bathroom to yell at him for falling asleep on the toilet, could be questioned later. “I’m fine.”

“Are you certain? You’ve been acting… odd, since yesterday.”

“Wonder why.” He said dryly. He glanced at the time on his phone and swore, he had three minutes to get down to the training hall. “Dammit, I gotta get to training. Gladio’s gonna kill me if I’m late.”

“Dinner will be ready for you when you return!” Ignis shouted at his retreating back, and sighed when the door was slammed behind his charge’s back. He thought he’d made progress

* * *

Dinner was, thankfully, a bunch of meat skewers that Noctis practically swallowed when he got back from training—stick and all. Gladio hadn’t gone lightly on him at all, forcing him to his limits and getting him to warp successfully a couple times before his knees gave out, and he couldn’t stand properly.

That was when Gladio started going easy on him.

“And you accuse _me_ of working you to death.” Ignis commented as he watched Noctis devour his dinner.

“Mmnno.” Noctis mumbled with a full mouth. “Gladio does his best to skewer me with his great sword. _You_ do your best to bore me to death with council meetings.”

“A necessary evil, you must concede.”

“Okay but we can both agree that all of the noblemen that show up to those meetings are the most aggravating assholes Bahamut ever allowed past the Walls, right?”

Ignis rolled his eyes and quickly put more of the meat skewer in his mouth to avoid answering, but Noctis knew a victory when he saw one. Once dinner was done, Noctis skimmed over the reports from the dreaded council meetings and things felt… normal, between him and Ignis. Like the tension between them had vanished, somewhat.

He didn’t know how or why that happened, but it did, and he was grateful for the slight amount of normalcy in his life.

It wasn’t until later—much, _much_ later that—that Noctis finally got to lie down in bed and relax. His body was still sore from training, and his back was acting up, the cool bed sheets doing wonders for his hot, overworked body. Blearily, he took his phone out of his pocket, swiping through his apps and trying to open his social media accounts.

He did a double take when his phone informed him that he didn’t have any storage left. With a pout, Noctis checked his photo library, ready to delete a couple of pictures from months prior.

He paused when he saw a video at the bottom, nearly three minutes long. He didn’t remember taking any videos recently, especially not any that were that long. Out of curiosity more than anything, he tapped on the small preview box and clicked play. Maybe it was a weird butt-recording or something.

The video started shakily, pointed at his throw rug in his bathroom, the shower running in the background. Noctis heard someone take a deep breath, and then someone said, _“Okay... okay.”_

The camera lifted up to point at his mirror, and Noctis’ heart nearly stopped. He frantically tapped at the screen, pausing the video to process what he was looking at because—

He was looking at himself, but not. His irises were a royal purple and almost glowed, even with the bright fluorescent lights of the bathroom on. His sclera, and the viens near his eyes, were dyed an inky black that made him look sickly and wrong. It was like some weird, off-brand version of himself had decided to make a video in his likeness.

He dismissed the possibility of the video being a prank almost immediately. The library showed that the video had been taken today, and he certainly hadn’t gone to school, so no one from school could’ve stolen his phone to have done this. The only people he’d interacted with today were Ignis, Gladio, and…

And the daemon.

“You’ve got to be kidding me.” Noctis whispered to himself, settling himself into a comfortable position before hitting play on the video once more.

_“Uh… hi, Noctis!”_ The him on screen nervously waved, only to wince and facepalm. _“Great. That was great. Really, a perfect way to start this stupid thing. Wonderful.”_

In the video, a few knocks came from the door. _“Noctis, are you quite alright? I thought I heard you talking.”_

_“Shit,”_ he whispered. _“Yeah, I’m fine! Just... talking to myself. No need to worry!”_

_“...Very well. Try not to dawdle._ _Remember, you have training in twenty minutes.”_

_“Got it.”_ The him on camera waited for Ignis’ steps to fade away before he turned back to his reflection. _“Okay, so, I probably don’t have a lot of time, so I’m just going to try and summarize this as best as possible because my life’s a freaking joke at this point._

_“I’m Andy. I know that’s completely unbelievable, because Andy’s an adorable little frog person that hung out in your jacket pocket, but I’m telling the honest-to-Astrals truth.”_ The him on camera raised his left wrist. _“About a week or two ago, I found a watch in a back alley, and I couldn’t take it off no matter what I did. This watch can turn me into completely different creatures, depending on what I select. I’ve only really tried out three of them, and one is the frog guy that you met._

_“I didn’t mean to deceive you, or… do_ this _—”_ Andy gestured at his body with a faint grimace. _“I meant to change into one guy, but the watch messed up and turned me into the floating guy that can apparently possess people, and I_ really _didn’t mean to do this and I hope I didn’t mess you up, but you deserved something of an explanation and I was a complete dick for ignoring you, but I freaked out._

_“I was scared that I was being called a traitor to Lucis and it’s really freaking obvious, when I’m a human, that I’m not a Lucian-born native. I don’t exactly match the perfect picture of Lucian beauty, believe it or not. So, I thought that if I told you anything, that you’d try to… I don’t know, hunt me down?”_ Andy shrugged and tried to smile, but it looked more like a grimace. Noctis felt his stomach knot with guilt.

_“Okay, but, back on track. Typically I’ve got, like, ten minutes for each transformation and I spent a good half of that time flying over to the Citadel from school, and Gods know how much time I’ve spent fucking around trying to process that I possessed you, so I’ve got to book it. I’m gonna end the recording and hopefully,_ hopefully, _sneak around this guy and get home. So, maybe we could talk later?”_

The video ended abruptly, probably because his phone ran out of space. There was a hopeful smile on Andy’s face, frozen a little crooked and a little unsure and a bit blurred, probably because he was about to lower the camera and hit ‘stop recording’.

And Noctis decided that yes, if that was indeed Andy, they should talk later.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Plooooot plotplotplotplot. Also, holy shit! We’re nearly halfway through this fic (with a potential epilogue? Who knows) and I haven’t abandoned it yet! God damn, that’s a good sign if anything.
> 
> \- I started writing this chapter when my stats class started learning about probability. In a way, I guess it was to vent, but the starting paragraph isn’t that complex. It’s just describing how you write ‘this is the probability of something’ in math, P(H)
> 
> \- “Mister Sperm Man” came from a conversation with yoitssabrinee on Tumblr. We admittedly lost our shit a bit at the name and I decided to incorporate it. You gotta admit, Ghostfreak does look a bit like a sperm with limbs. I did put a bit of Omniverse’s design in Phasma, but not a lot. All I did was add the cool chains he got, and the purple eye stays!
> 
> \- The main reason why this chapter kicked my ass was because I didn’t know what I wanted to do for the possession scene. For a while, I contemplated Noctis still being cognizant while Prompto took his body for a joyride, but I started to realize that that was going to be SUPER HARD TO WRITE and made no sense, given how Ghostfreak usually possesses people. I eventually settled with the video explanation that Prompto gave Noctis, for sake of simplicity, if nothing else.
> 
> \- Another reason why this took me forever to write—this one chapter forced me to restructure at least half of the remaining chapters for Moxy to make what I want to happen work. The end product is unlikely to be different, but the chapters leading up to our wonderful chapter 11? Yeah, no, they’re different from the beta product lmao.


End file.
